


The son of Jupiter

by Goonlalagoon



Series: SPQR [1]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Camp Jupiter, Don't copy to another site, Found Family, Gen, Pre-The Heroes of Olympus, Pre-The Trials of Apollo, The Titan War, The Twelfth Legion, canon typical levels of violence, my very erratic and surface level understanding of how the Roman army and society functioned, originally posted on ff.net
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-25
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:21:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 34,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22408606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Goonlalagoon/pseuds/Goonlalagoon
Summary: Jason Grace has been living at Camp Jupiter since he was three, but now he's old enough to officially join the Legion - which also means taking on Probatio status until he's either served in the Legion for a full year, or committed an act of valour.As if proving himself to, well, everyone wasn't enough, he's been having dark dreams - and it's a foolish demigod who ignores their dreams...[Or: part one of five following what Jason and the Romans were up to during the original PJO timeline]
Series: SPQR [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1612669
Comments: 43
Kudos: 25





	1. Nulla: A note before we start

**Author's Note:**

> Part one of 5; parts two & three are actually already written, and part four is maybe halfway there? I originally posted this on ff.net back in 2015, and am cross-posting while motivating myself to finish editing and writing the rest of the installments. I've done some minor tweaks while posting here, but not any significant plot changes
> 
> Glossary & "who's who" in the final chapter

Before I begin, I want to make one thing clear. I never asked for this. I didn’t ask to be the child of one mortal, one god - in common parlance, a _demigod_ or _half-blood._ Yeah, you heard right: the Roman gods are alive and kicking in the modern day and age, only now they’re not based in Rome. They moved with the tide of Western Civilization, so now? The Roman gods tend to hang out in the good old United States of America.

I didn’t want my dad to be Jupiter, king of the gods, and my patron to be his immortal wife, Juno Montea - my godly stepmom, I guess. I didn’t want to be given to the wolves when I was _three_ to prevent said pretty much all-powerful stepmom from getting a little… fatally sharp with the mortal part of my family: my mom and my big sister. 

Of course, I didn’t get much say in it, what with being three and half-mortal, and all.

Thing is, being a demigod comes with a whole _trireme’s_ worth of problems, from exploding pizza to monsters who want to tear you and your friends limb from limb for the fun of it. So if what I’m about to tell you all sounds like a fun story, well. I hope you never find out what it’s like to face it all in real life. Read what I have to say, laugh at the funny bits (and there _are_ funny moments - even for a demigod, life isn’t all bleak), maybe cry at the sad bits (the gods know I did), and when you’re done, close the book and put it away with a smile and think it’s fiction (some days I wish I could). _Dis,_ maybe you’ll even _wish_ it was true, that this was your life. You’re lucky, because I can guarantee it’s more fun to read about than to live. But go ahead. Daydream and enjoy, because among other things, being a demigod teaches you the importance of stories.

If it sounds familiar, like it actually _could_ be part of your life? 

Pack your bag and be ready to leave when the wolves come for you. And now that you’ve realized, they’ll probably already be on their way, because once you realize the monsters start noticing you in earnest and that means they need to reach you first. Don’t run. They’re the ancient guardians of the spirit of Rome, and they’re on your side. Mostly. Don’t show fear. Don’t show doubt. Follow them, and learn everything you can. They’ll take you to Lupa, and if she thinks you’re tough enough, she’ll bring you here, to Camp Jupiter and the Twelfth Legion.

Trust me, it’s the only way you’re going to survive.


	2. I: Welcome to the Twelfth Legion (again)

Octavian was trying unsuccessfully not to smirk as he gave his speech, and I had to work pretty hard not to roll my eyes back at him. This was, everyone knew, ridiculous. I’d been living at Camp Jupiter with the Twelfth Legion since I was the grand old age of _three,_ training with them since I was old enough to hold a weapon, and basically being part of the Legion in all but name.

  
It was this last part that had been the problem. See, Romans are sticklers for rules, on the whole. Sure, we’ll break little things like _don’t go down this road_ , or _no driving for under sixteens_ when it’s drive or die, but the big customs? Well, if we haven’t got our traditions we haven’t got anything, and the _lares_ \- the Camp guardian spirits, all slightly see through, all slightly annoying - had kicked up a fuss when they realised I was now eleven and could join the Legion _properly_.

“I have consulted the augeries, and they are favourable; the gods condone the acceptance of Jason Grace, son of Jupiter, into the Legion…” I could hear a shuffling behind me, someone’s armor rattling as they shifted. Probably trying not to laugh. _I_ was trying not to laugh, and even managing it, so at least one god was probably feeling sorry for me and keeping Risos away. Maybe even my father; it’d probably be pretty bad press for his only kid to start cracking up during his official introduction to the Legion. Maybe he had the laughter spirit tied up somewhere on Olympus, or busy in some late-night comedy club on the other side of the world. Or maybe I just wasn’t interesting enough for Risos to be paying me a visit anyway. That was more likely than my father having the spare time to distract a minor god on my behalf.

  
Thing is, this _should_ have been a serious life event. For pretty much everyone I knew, arriving at the Legion and being officially accepted was a big deal, and pretty nerve wracking. They make you stand in front of everyone while Octavian tells everybody the augeries are good - they always are, because if they’re _not_ we pretty obviously don’t bother with the whole joining the Legion thing - and anything else we know about you. When this _first_ happened to me, I was terrified. I think I may even have been crying for a lot of it. Hey, I was three, okay? And I had a limited grasp of what was going on, it was just all these people I’d only just met making long speeches and arguing over which cohort I should be in, while I was still adjusting to the idea that I couldn't live with my mom and sister anymore.

My point is, it’s pretty difficult to take major life events seriously when you know that absolutely nothing is changing.

  
“…welcome to the Twelfth Legion, _probatio_ Jason Grace.”

  
Oh yeah. Except for that little gem. See, it’s the rules that when you first arrive at Camp and join the Legion, you become a probatio. It’s the bottom rank, and as you can guess from the name it’s the probation period. You stay a probatio for a full year, or until you commit an act of bravery deemed sufficient to earn a full place in the Legion, whichever happens first. Until then? You’re bottom of the pile.

I’d never taken probatio rank because I hadn't so much joined as been adopted, and to make things more topsy-turvy, I already had my full Legionnaire SPQR tattoo, thanks to some rare godly intervention on Juno’s part when I first arrived at Camp Jupiter: an eagle (my dad’s holy symbol) over the letters “SPQR”, followed by a line for each year I’d spent in the Legion - eight in total.

Yep, eight years at the Legion, and _now_ I get to go through probatio. Fair’s fair, I guess, but it was kinda annoying. I’d already had a few acts of bravery - or dumb luck, depending who you talked to - most of which would have equaled _goodbye probatio status_ if I’d _been_ probatio at the time, but I wasn’t and of course past deeds don’t count. So now I was going to have to wander around as probatio when I’d been here longer than most of the others until I could earn myself full Legionnaire status. When we’d have another total non-ceremony where Octavian got to give a speech about how I was now a full member of the Legion and supposedly give me my official Legion tattoo. Which I already _had_ , because nobody had really known how to deal when a three year old arrived at camp and Juno had decided to make their minds up for them.

By the time lunch hour came around, I was sick to death of being called probatio, so when Mel announced her presence at our usual table by cheerfully clapping me on the shoulder with a friendly and enthusiastic “So, probatio Grace, how’re you finding your _very first day_ in the Legion?” I was completely out of witty replies or even accommodating smiles. I just thunked my head down on the table and covered it with my arms. Melody laughed, dark eyes dancing with humour, and dropped down onto the bench next to me, accepting her usual plate of food from one of the _aurae_ as it whirled past her head.

“Don’t worry. The amusement value will wear off soon, and people will find something else to joke about.” I could never tell when Mel was being honest rather than lying through her teeth, but I really hoped it was the former. She’s been one of the centurions for the Fifth cohort as long as I’ve been at Camp Jupiter - so she’s been one of _my_ centurions since the day I got here, all adorable chubby cheeked toddler with duckling down blond hair and blue eyes, and had the (dubious) honour of looking after me. Like most Roman military bases in the history of, well, Rome, Camp Jupiter wasn’t exactly set up for dealing with toddlers, but when Juno, Queen of the Gods and special godly advisor to the state wants her ward to be there? Well, that’s when they suck it up and start dealing with toddlers.

I had a somewhat _unconventional_ childhood, to say the least.

I cheered up somewhat over lunch. Mel and I were joined by our usual lunchtime crowd - Dakota, Gwen and Bobby, all other members of the Fifth cohort, as well as Will from the Fourth and more unusually Jacob from the First. They were all a few years older than me, which could sometimes get a little awkward, but mostly was fine. Age becomes a little less important in the Legion. It helped that Mel was always so uncaring about it; she was only a few years older than I was at this point when she first arrived at the Legion, and that had been a few years before _I_ first arrived in all my toddler glory, so all in all she was twenty three now. She was the oldest person in the Legion and showed no sign of leaving, thank all the gods. I’d never told her, but when I was little I’d wished I looked more like her, dark hair and tan skin, so that people would think we were really related. She was definitely family, even if we clearly didn’t share any blood. New recruits always wondered why if she’s the oldest she wasn’t one of the _praetors_ , and to be honest, I heard a different joke answer pretty much anytime anyone asked.

Ultimately, it came down to the simple fact that she’d never been voted in as praetor. It’s not a job you apply for or get after a certain period of service; you have to _earn_ it, and you have to be the right person for the job. Mel was always pretty clear that she wasn’t that person. She talked a lot about what kind of person the _praetor_ should be, because _literally everyone_ expected me to be one when I was older, and she figured I may as well know what I’m in for. I could never decide if I loved her for preparing me, or loathed her reminding me. Sometimes it just depended on what kind of mood I was in.

So, anyway, lunch was pretty standard. Good, healthy food - the wind spirits, or aurae _,_ who wait on us don’t really get the concept of “fast food”, and if you try to ask about it, they get all offended as though you’re saying they’re slow. Lots of chatter, mostly gossip about the other Legionnaires and talking about the events of morning training, tips on looking after armor and new battle strategies. Y’know, the usual teen conversations. We also had to kick a faun out of the mess hall. They’re half goat, half human, and _all_ annoying. They do nothing helpful, just get underfoot and keep asking for money or anything valuable. I don’t even know why, because they don’t have any use for it. Maybe they just like shiny stuff, I dunno. Officially they’re not supposed to come into Camp itself, but there’s always one or two who’ve snuck in to annoy people. Afternoon training was when things began to go pear-shaped. Like, literally the second I got to afternoon training things started to go downhill, because for afternoon training we were paired up with First cohort for “Legion bonding”, and that never ends well.

A word on cohorts, just to set the scene for those of you who didn’t grow up in a Roman military camp slap bang in California, in the good ol’ USA. In the _original_ Roman army, there were ten cohorts to a Legion, nine with around 480 men, and the First cohort being pretty much _double_ that. What with the actual Empire having ceased to exist quite some time before the present day, unsurprisingly we work on a slightly smaller scale. We don’t have 480 _people_ , let alone in a single cohort. Instead, our cohorts can take up to forty people each, though we’re usually not at full strength. We’re also all in some way related to the gods, either demigods like me, or legacies like Bobby. Nearly all demigods will come to Camp Jupiter, usually in their teens. The older you get, and the more _aware_ you get of your own heritage, the more monsters notice you. It’s rare - even unheard of - for anyone to not spend their ten years of service at Camp Jupiter and survive into adulthood. Legacies have fewer problems, but can still attract monsters and benefit from the training, not to mention the support system when everything goes horribly wrong.

The ranking of honour within the Legion goes as you might expect: First the best, Fifth the _losers_. Well, according to everyone else. Me? I like the Fifth just _fine_. That’s why I chose them when I first arrived at Camp Jupiter. I don’t think Octavian will ever forgive me, but that’s a story for another time. So you’ve got your cohorts, and you’ve got your ranking, and you’ve up to two hundred teenagers (mostly) living in this system. As you have probably guessed, we weren’t always all happy campers singing songs around the campfire the whole time. Long story short, Fifth are the butt of every joke, and the First are the ones who crack the jokes. Actually, no, I take that back. First are the ones the jokes get cracked _to_ , in hopes of impressing them.

And then some sensible people decided to take this powder keg of not-so-good-will and give us all swords.

Roman logic is a wonderful thing.

“Are you _tired_ my little lads and lasses?” Jack was in his element: rude, shouting, and driving people to the point of collapse. It was a skill set I assume he’d been born with, and he’d only honed it further in his years as centurion of the First cohort. He strode about while we stretched after our warm up, glaring fiercely at us all like a demented drill seargent. He looked the part, too: like most guys at camp, he had the regulation military style haircut, and thanks to the fitness regime was in good shape. Over the years he’d gained a collection of scars and a crooked nose from a poorly set break, which added to the tough soldier look. “Get up! Get _on!_ You think a draken will care that you want to take a breather when you’re trying to cut off its head?” One of the probatios - one of the _other_ probatios - made the mistake of laughing. She’d only been with us for a few weeks, and it was likely that she’d never trained with Jack before. He usually left the complete beginners to Mel, because she was more accepting of the fact that not everyone had been brought up with the promise of joining the Legion in exchange for good behaviour and maybe hadn’t been trained in the basics before heading to the Wolf House.

“If you can laugh, you can train! Up and run! Take three!” The poor girl looked bewildered, and Jacob coughed loudly to attract her attention, holding three fingers up against the side of his face Jack couldn’t see. Pablo pointed discretely at the field margin as he pushed his lank brown hair out of his eyes, and I made running motions with my right hand over my left palm. It clicked after a second that we were miming three laps. For a heartbeat I thought she might object to being singled out, but she was smarter than that, and just got on with it. It probably tells you a lot about Jack’s approach to training that the three of us had a routine in place for passing on this message.

We were exchanging resigned looks as we scrambled back to our feet when someone flicked the back of my head lightly.

“So, how has your morning been, _probatio_ Grace?” I gritted my teeth. It was an innocent enough question, but the tone was only just the polite side of cutting, with a deliberate emphasis on _“probatio”_ that set my teeth on edge.  
“My morning was fine, thank you, _probatio_ Wells.” She arched an eyebrow at my admittedly even less polite tone of voice. Louisa Wells just grated on my nerves, no matter what she was doing. She’d arrived the month before, letters of recommendation overflowing from her pocket and recieving the resultant instant respect from the First Cohort. Unlike me, she’d taken them up on their offer of a place in their ranks. Also unlike me, she’d been made probatio on day one, and had made it quite clear she thought it was favoritism that I hadn’t had to go through it. Repeatedly. At every possible opportunity.

Before she had a chance to reply, Jack was pairing us up for sparring drills.

“- and our two remaining probatios can train together.” My heart sank as I realised he was talking about us. The centurion caught my eye and gave a cool smile, almost daring me to object. Of course, I couldn’t. We weren’t allowed to pick and choose our training partners, not for this kind of drill. We also weren’t allowed to say we didn’t want to train with someone just because we didn’t _like_ them. Believe me, it’s been tried, and it doesn’t go down well.

So we squared off with _rudes_ \- wooden training swords - and shields, running through basic drills that I could do in my sleep. Even if I didn’t particularly like her, I had to admit that as far as training partners went Louisa wasn’t too bad, except for one thing. She kept up a constant muttered commentary. Not even “I’m reminding myself of technical pointers” or “oh _Dis_ that was too close”. That would be fine. Annoying, but fine. Oh no, this was all slippery words targeted at me.  
“Sure this isn’t too easy for such an experienced soldier as yourself, _probatio_ Grace? I’m sure if you’d rather train with someone more _advanced,_ the Centurion would be _delighted_ to accommodate.” I forced a smile back, unsure of what reaction she was trying to get.  
“Actually, there’s still plenty I can learn from this. But thanks anyway.”  
“How very un-Roman of you. I’d have thought you’d be yearning for a challenge.” I stumbled a little, taken aback at the change of tone, and her next strike slipped past my shield. She’d been using more force than was really necessary for a warm up drill, and I barely choked back a yelp as it slammed down on my collarbone. Of course, Jack was watching and was hardly going to let that pass without comment.

“Grace! Quit fooling around. It’s a poor outlook if you can’t handle this drill better than a new recruit!” There were scattered chuckles, and this time he didn’t use it as an excuse to push everyone to train harder, just smirked. _Git._ I saw Mel grit her teeth from where she was correcting Anya, the red haired probatio who’d laughed at the draken comment, on something. My face began to burn, and I spared a thought to curse my relatively pale skin, because of course everyone could see that I was embarrassed. “Get back to it, and do try not to take any more strikes! If we trained with live weapons, like real Romans, then you’d be in the infirmary right now.” Mel snorted with a suppressed laugh, which must have been intentional because she’s a master at poker faces, and raised an eyebrow when Jack looked over at her.  
“’Real’ Roman Legions trained with rudes for exactly that reason.” His skin was too dark to show the kind of tomato flush mine did, but I could have sworn his cheeks were a even darker than usual as he ordered us all to quit slacking.

That, sadly, was the highlight of my session. Louisa didn’t bother with more quips, but there was a victorious glint in her eyes that needled at me. I’d bet she knew it, too, from the way she kept grinning, white teeth flashing against her dark skin. Unfortunately, my right shoulder was aching and stiff - I didn’t need to look to know I had a sizeable bruise swelling up - and I was out of focus with lingering embarrassment, so even without any more incidents I wasn’t at my best, and felt like it was glaringly obvious.

But it was when we were packing up that my day really turned sour. Being probatio gets you lots of little extra chores. So long as experience isn’t required, you’re the errand boys (and girls), the ones who have to carry things back and forth, the ones who have to do the spontaneous inventory taking when the Centurion in charge of training is in a bad mood. That sort of thing. Jack stayed to supervise our surprise inventory take, and I did my best to ignore him, sticking with Anya, who was another one of the Fifth. She didn’t really know what she was doing, not without guidance, given she’d only been around for a week or so, and seeing as Mel had had to go sort centurion stuff I was helping her out. Anyway, we were just getting on with it, while Louisa kept up a friendly conversation with Jack, who occasionally took breaks to shout at us to get a move on. We were almost done when Louisa brought up the question of probatio status.

“So when we say “heroic deed”, what do you mean? Like, who judges? The gods?” Jack laughed, but it wasn’t unfriendly.  
“Nah, the gods have better things to do. It’s the praetors’ decision, though they usually take it before the senate for formality. Generally, something happens and you respond in a way that is deemed heroic, and your centurion takes it officially before the praetors for consideration.” Louisa nodded thoughtfully.  
“Is there… does it make a difference whether you lose probatio status by deed or by time?”  
“Officially? No.” Jack didn’t bother expanding on the _unofficial_ opinion. In a moment, he and Louisa were discussing the ways in which different members of the Legion had lost their probatio status. As Jack was telling her all about how one of the Second lost his probatio by dragging three kids out of a burning building in New Rome, the city just by camp, Anya gave a small sigh.  
“Bet that I just have to sit it out.” I shrugged.  
“Well, it doesn’t really matter. Sitting it out means that you had to go a whole year without doing something seriously wrong. That’s how Mel did it. Besides, a full year gives you plenty of time to do something heroic. You might surprise yourself.” She sighed again.  
“Maybe.” She didn’t sound at all convinced. “But it would be nice to do something brave. _You’re_ certain to.” I must have looked surprised, because she laughed quietly. “I mean, you’re Jason Grace, son of _Jupiter_ , king of the gods. Of course you’re going to do something really impressive.” Jack declared that we were done and time to get to evening muster. I trailed alongside Anya, feeling like my heart had suddenly turned to concrete and sunk into my boots. 

_Of course_ I was going to do something really impressive.

With cold certainty, I realised that she was right, even if she didn’t know exactly what she was saying. I was Jason Grace, son of Jupiter, and I was going to have to do something really impressive, or I would _never_ live it down. I’d be laughing stock of the Legion, _and_ my father would probably be horrifically embarrassed. 


	3. II: Summer Camp, Roman style

It took me hours to fall asleep, despite the exhausting day of training, and when I did, the weight that had settled in my stomach like lead seemed to have followed me, poisoning my dreams.

The nightmare started off innocently enough. I was just walking down the _Via Praetoria,_ the main road leading from Camp Jupiter itself to the city of New Rome. I don’t know why, maybe I was heading to the bakery to get some brownies - they do the _best_ brownies. Anyway, for whatever reason, I was walking along the road. And I felt weirdly urgent, like maybe the bakery was about to close (I know I’m talking about the bakery a lot here: it’s just that good!). Only somehow I got twisted around, even though I’ve walked that road on a near daily basis since I was three. And suddenly I was at the top of Temple Hill, in front of the temple to Jupiter Optimus Maximus (also known to me as “father”), even though a second before I’d been walking on the stretch of road _after_ the turn off, I’d swear to it. It was at this point that I realised I was dreaming, and I had a blessed moment of amused peace of mind. I figured maybe this was the gods’ way of telling me I needed to leave them some more offerings, or something. Maybe my father wanted some of those brownies too.  
“Um… I apologise deeply if I have been…” The stuttering attempt at a formal apology and promise of brownie offerings died in my throat as the white marble glowed orange. After a second of confusion, I realised what it must be, and spun on my heel.

New Rome was burning.

I stumbled towards it, shouting, cursing, wondering why no-one was answering the alarm bells, wondering how the fire had spread so quickly. I looked towards Camp to see where everyone was, and froze in place. Camp Jupiter was _gone._ It was just a rectangle of dirt, with piles of ash turning everything grey. I looked back at New Rome, and it was already half gone. I could hear screams, the roar of hungry flames leaping and twisting into the sky. Even as I stared, the senate house collapsed, followed by the coliseum and everything else. A rumble behind me made me jump and scramble back to my feet, not even having realised I’d fallen to my knees. The temples, one by one, turned to dust and blew away in the wind, as though they had never been there at all.

_“JASON!”_

I jerked awake, panting and coughing on imaginary smoke. Mel stood by my bunk, frowning in concern, Dakota leaning against the ladder and blinking blearily at me. With a flush of embarrassment, I realised I must have been making enough noise in my sleep to wake him - something of a feat, as Dakota was renowned for sleeping like a log at night and being hyper as a terrier puppy by day.  
“I - sorry.”   
“You okay, Jase?” I shrugged and sat up, curling my knees into my chest and clamping my arms around them so my friends couldn’t see me trembling.  
“Yeah. Bad dream.” Dakota mumbled something that could have been a curse, and ducked back into the bunk opposite mine. I heard various shuffling sounds, and stifled a groan. Of course, if I’d woken Dakota, I must have woken pretty much everyone _else_ in the barrack as well. Thankfully it wasn’t full - each cohort got four ten bunk barracks, but there were only around fifteen of us in the 5th, and we were split over three of them. Melody ruffled my hair gently.  
“Sure you’re alright?” I nodded, silently begging her not to slip absent-mindedly back into Mother Duck to Baby Jason mode, which she still did occasionally, and suggest I crash on the spare bunk below hers. That had been fine when I was a little kid, but I was eleven, and wasn’t a baby anymore. Either she got the message or the idea didn’t occur, and she just patted my shoulder and dabbed some oil from a little vial onto the back of my neck.  
“There. That should help you doze off again. Try to rest up, okay? Come fetch me if you have any more issues.” She left to return to her own barracks, and I drowsily wondered whether Dakota had fetched her or if she’d just been doing one of her spot checks on us. The male centurion for the 5th, Alexei, who had been centurion almost as long as Mel, was absent from the boy’s barracks, but that was no surprise.

He had an awful sleeping pattern and set of habits, left over from a really nasty monster encounter a few years before which gave him constant night terrors, and was near impossible to sleep in the same room as - particularly because if he woke up disorientated and heard breathing, his instinct was to throw a knife at you. He had good aim, and the only reason we hadn’t had a fatality from that particular incident was that Pablo, a recently arrived son of Mercury, had been so tired after training he’d forgotten to take off his armor before falling asleep. Alexei had packed up his stuff the next morning, after spending the rest of the night refusing to sleep, and moved into one of the Fifth’s empty barracks, declaring that enough people tried to kill us without our own centurions getting in on it. With a year or so’s perspective on it, he had started cracking jokes about the privacy and space, and had got the whole place set up into a one-man fortress, complete with doorbell and a honest to gods _moat_. He’s a son of Vulcan, in case you couldn’t tell, and the whole place is now a very tidy crazy inventor’s workshop. To be honest, I think he could probably have built some kind of shield for his bunk to prevent any accidents involving weapons, at least after the first shock and guilt faded off a bit, but that he just wants - needs - the space sometimes. Not that anyone can blame him. Spending a few weeks trapped in a _myrmeke_ nest would give anyone issues, even ignoring everything _else_ that went to Dis in a hand basket on that particular expedition.

I dropped back off to sleep pretty quickly, the calming oil Mel had used doing the trick. Luckily, I didn’t have any more crumbling world nightmares, but I slept lightly and fitfully, and woke up feeling like I hadn’t really gotten any rest. It was almost a relief when the wake up bells rang - _almost_. You have to have had a _really_ bad night for the daily six o’clock wake up to be welcomed. Yeah, you heard me. _Six A.M. starts every weekday_. We’re _Romans,_ and _real_ Romans go for a healthy run and swim every morning at six fifteen to wake up and _earn_ their breakfast. A lot of store is set by being real Romans around here, at least by some people - and several of them happen to be the people in charge, so that means we all get to go for early morning runs and brisk dips in the lake and do all sorts of other fun things before breakfast.

The Romans must have had really weird senses of fun to apparently enjoy being freezing cold and feeling like Lupa herself was chewing on their stomachs.

I staggered through the run with my fellow members of the Fifth, ignoring the racing of the First and Second - on some days, I was tempted to join them and see how many I could beat. Despite what everyone thinks, just because you’re in the Fifth doesn’t mean you’re a total push over. But on this particular morning, I was doing well to just put one foot in front of the other, so I ignored Octavian and Jacob striving to overtake one another while still keeping a pace they could maintain and settled into place with Pablo on one side of me and Anya on the other. She was actually a quicker runner than either of us, by a wide margin, but had figured out pretty soon after arriving that pacing herself in the morning run rather than trying to prove herself was better than showing off and being unable to keep up with training later in the day. By the end of the swim I was actually starting to feel a bit better. At least _doing_ something distracted me from dwelling on my nightmares. We started the jog back towards Camp, clothes sticking to damp skin, and I was even starting to feel my mood lift a little, when we reached the point in the road that my dream-self had been on. I couldn’t help glancing up at Temple Hill; the sun glanced off of the gleaming marble of Jupiter’s temple, and for a milisecond I thought it was reflecting burning buildings. I shuddered, and stubbornly refused to look anywhere except the path by my feet for the rest of the run back to Camp.

Even though nothing bad actually happened, my sour mood refused to lift for the rest of the day, the sight of New Rome falling emblazoned across the backs of my eyelids every time I blinked. Ironically, I actually did pretty well at training despite - or perhaps because - of this. I was so determined _not_ to think about it that I threw myself into things wholeheartedly. It helped that we weren’t doing any inter-cohort stuff, instead just training as one unit. That meant we were under the tender care of Mel and Alexei. They were both less harsh than Jack, though I always suspected he was less vicious when it was just the First, but they weren’t about to let us slack off either.

Before we got to actual training, we had an hour of history, even though it was technically the holidays. We may not have to study maths, but gods forbid we can’t list the Roman Emperors in reverse order without more than thirty seconds pause for thought. Lessons were always something of a trial: most of us were diagnosed with ADHD, mild dyslexia, serious dyscalculia, or a combination of the three. It’s kinda a demigod thing; our brains get hardwired for battle reflexes, reading in Latin and reading Roman numerals, and those are the closest mortal diagnoses. After that, it was a two-hour strength and fitness session, just in case the run-swim-run morning combo hadn’t gotten our heart rates up quite enough. Seeing as by this time, everyone is starting to dream happily of food, the good ol’ Roman training approach dictates, apparently, that we then spend half an hour stretching.

The lunch bell is an absolute godsend, and that’s coming from a demigod. The afternoon of training was no less intense than the morning. After lunch we had another hour of lessons, this time on monster recognition and tactics, followed by three hours of assorted training - this bit varied between days most of all, and included sword fighting, archery, hand to hand combat, teamwork formation stuff, you name it. Once or twice a week we merged with different cohorts to get used to working together, preferably with the minimum of backstabbing. Like I said, on this particular day my nightmare induced determination to be distracted was useful, because we were doing a new team shield defence, and I had to concentrate pretty hard both to move in the right places and to not trip other people up. Even with absolute focus, I hit the floor heavily a couple of times underneath one or other of my cohort fellows. We finished up with Camp Chore Time, when different cohorts got their week’s duties done - mucking stables, armory inventory, that kind of stuff. Some duties had to be done at other times, obviously, like feeding the pegasi or the unicorns. Day after day of this got pretty exhausting, I can tell you. Weekends we only had morning training, with the morning lesson slot replaced by chore time. Oh, yeah, and we had morning and evening muster too. 

Muster is basically a role call and equipment check combo. The cohorts have to be in place, all lined up neatly like proper Romans (and the lares let you know if you’re not, with plenty of _“Back in_ my _day”_ talk. Back in the day for Roman ghosts is quite a long way back) so the praetors can do a role call and glance over everyone for any obviously uncleaned gear. Your centurions do a check too, because it reflects badly on them if you aren’t battle ready. Muster is when new recruits are introduced and join a cohort. It’s also when announcements are made, and on this occasion, Rich and Violet finished up their inspection by announcing War Games, which got a cheer that I swear shook some of the nearby buildings. Rich held up a hand sternly, and everyone quietened immediately. He isn’t the biggest guy in the world, particularly not when standing next to Violet, who’s all broad shoulders and muscle, not to mention a head or so taller, but he’s got the praetor knack for commanding an audience.  
“However, we will _not_ be playing tonight. Instead, you have three days to prepare - no building will take place before the evening of the event. First and Second will be attacking, Fourth are prohibited from entering as per the decree after their behavior last time, leaving Third and Fifth to defend. Fourth cohort looked pretty put out, but they really had screwed up. There had been a _big_ personal vendetta going on between Fourth and Third at the time, involving several people on each side, and the whole cohort, or near enough, had decided to disobey Third’s orders during the games, which led to several members of the Third getting badly injured. The praetors had been _furious_ , and banned Fourth from the next two War Games. Given that we only do actual War Games every couple of weeks, that’s quite a lot to miss. They weren’t banned from the lower-level ones, which are more like a strategy board game designed to test our ability to come up with plans and stuff, only the full battle ones. 

To be honest, Third and Fifth were looking pretty put out too, despite the fact that a moment ago most people had been cheering, and that War Games are one of the best things about Camp. Most people had completely forgotten the punishment, and that it’d make things very uneven. It was pretty unfair to put First and Second together, too, because it put our pair of cohorts at a disadvantage. It’s tough to admit, but Fifth were definitely the stragglers of the pack, no matter how much I loved my cohort. Any recruit with Legion connections goes to the higher cohorts, because they come with letters of recommendation from previous Legionnaires, and often that means they’ve had some prior training or advice. So absolutely no-one in the Fifth comes from that kind of background. And because we’re always bottom of the pile, we get treated like it - so a) no-one _wants_ to join us, b) we get last call on equipment, training slots, and (worst of all) c) we get the worst duties. _Officially_ that last isn’t the case, but it really is. Being in the Fifth you’re waaaayyyy more likely to get the early-morning duties and yucky stuff to do than the higher cohorts. It sucks, and I’d been putting up with it since I was three. Third were looking more fed up and pissed off, while Fifth were mostly looking resigned. Three guesses which cohort tends to be thrown to the wolves in War Games?

Got it in one.

So, all in all, no-one in our team was feeling particularly hopeful about War Games. But the thing about War Games was that even if you knew you were going to be steamrollered, you still had to do the best you could, because if you just left the flags unguarded and tried to let the others walk right in to take them, they’d make a _point_ of coming after you even so. Plus you’d get into serious trouble with the praetors for not taking things seriously and shaming the ideals of the Legion and of Rome, et cetera, et cetera. And you would never - and I mean _never_ \- hear the end of it. Other Legionnaires would be writing to you sixty years later to remind you about that one time as a teenager when you decided not to fight an already lost battle during summer camp. 

“Right. We all know this is going to be a tough one.” Alexei looked around the Fifth cohort, gathered into our unoccupied barracks. We used it as a general common room and work point. Everyone except Anya nodded gloomily, and she just looked confused. She hadn’t yet experienced the joy that was being made a joke out of in War Games, and nobody could quite think how to prepare her. “We’ll be meeting with Third after dinner tomorrow to hash out a strategy for the Games, so _this_ evening, we’re going to have our own brainstorm session to see what we can come up with, and do an equipment check so that we’re as prepared as we can be.”  
“Now, if we could start _building_ , things would be much less unbalanced,” Alexei grinned and ducked his head as Mel took over with a smile “but just because we can’t let Alexei do what he does best doesn’t mean we can’t start planning, so any trap ideas, talk to Alexei to figure out if they’d be feasible in short turnaround. And _anything_ that will stop Hannibal, please!” Hannibal is Twelfth Legion’s heavy cavalry. He’s an elephant in a bullet proof vest. You get used to him, but you do have to watch where you put your feet when he's around. Mucking out Hannibal is one of the really unpleasant tasks, which as mentioned Fifth cohort seems to get lumped with a little more often than you’d expect.

Mel and Alexei had laid out a couple of maps of the Field of Mars, the battleground, for the sake of planning, and the blow by blow summaries of the last few games, to look for patterns in strategies. It was early in the Camp season, and they were trying desperately to keep up some enthusiasm. This was only the second year I’d been allowed to take part in the Games proper - a Roman Legion with an average age of around fifteen had a vague concept of health and safety when it came to people under the age of ten, who would have guessed - and I should have been feeling way more excited than I was. Our strategy meeting didn’t last too long, but Alexei left with a few rough ideas to figure out. Engineering was just about the only thing the Third (or any of the other cohorts) would listen to us on, which didn’t help anyone with enthusiasm about strategy planning either . It says something about how good Alexei was at it that the other cohorts would listen to him about this stuff at all. 

By morning, I was feeling a bit more cheerful. I didn’t have another nightmare, thankfully, so woke up feeling refreshed and less like there was smoke constantly catching in the back of my throat. I started to look forwards to War Games, too - as Mel was keen of drumming home when we trained, the battle’s not over until someone’s won. And if you don’t try, you automatically lose. Morning run was a miserable one, because it tipped it down with rain, right up until Jack provided exactly what it needed to make it great. He slipped in mud. He got up. He slipped in mud again. He got up again. He slipped in the mud _again_ and rolled down a slope. Most of us were in absolute stitches, because Jack is one of those in the First who’s usually off racing and sneering at everyone who takes more than half an hour to do the whole run and swim combo, which is over half the Legion. He also mocks anyone who falls over or anything like that, at any point in their Legion experience. Even other members of the First were sniggering, and he was absolutely fuming. It almost made up for some of the regular insults he hurled at me and the rest of the Fifth.

It did mean that all of us were mud-splattered and soaked through when we got back to Camp, later than usual because most of us had had to stop running we were laughing so hard to avoid slipping over ourselves, and had to change before breakfast, so only got twenty minutes or so to scarf down food before our morning session, but it had absolutely been worth it. Maybe it was petty, but hey. He totally deserved to be ridiculed for a change. Anyway, the day was pretty standard. Despite the weather we still had to train outside for all the usual sessions - monsters won’t go easy just because of the weather, not unless you’re really lucky, which demigods never are - but we finished a bit early each time because you have to clean all the equipment properly and dry it, or it’ll start to rust really quickly, and we don’t have equipment to spare at the best of times.

The strategy meeting, as expected, involved lots of the Third telling us what we were going to be doing and not much discussing it, though Alexei managed to convince them about a couple of bits of fort design that could be built in the time frame we had available. They didn’t actually _say_ “and we’ll let them chew you up and hope you can tire them out a bit”, but that was the actual plan, and we all knew it. Being in the Fifth was just great for your self esteem (I could never keep a straight face when I said that, but Mel does a great deadpan), and I’d sworn to all the gods multiple times that one day I was going to change it. Until then, I guess we all just had to deal with being the cannon fodder.

One major advantage of advance warning War Games was that you usually got a slot with your team side cohorts one afternoon to practice some strategy, and could spend individual cohort training time focusing on things you were expecting to use. Of course, that also meant that your opponent cohorts got the same benefits, and you had to try to keep your strategy under wraps for longer. Between planning, training, and watching out for spies - the usual feeling was that if you couldn’t keep your plans from the other team, you deserved to be trounced, though officially spying was against the rules, so of course you just had to be really good at it instead - the days leading up to Friday’s War Games went quickly. Despite the disadvantage of not having the Fourth around, we were feeling surprisingly confident. Alexei and Anya had come up with some super-neat traps that we could build into the walls and floor of the fort, and given that he’d only worked on the details of them hidden away in the Fifth’s barracks, we were pretty sure that there was no way the other team could know about them. Which just might tip the balance into our favor, for once.

We only had a couple of hours to build our defenses, after evening muster and dinner. It’s pretty tight, but Romans get lots of practice at building quickly, plus there’s usually various left over bits and pieces of buildings from the last games that we can use. The Field of Mars is littered with that kind of stuff, though we do clean up after games. The Legion reckons part of the fun is seeing what’s left over to use, all “make use of what you can find” and “work with your surroundings.” Mars himself probably didn’t mind, given that he’s the god of war, and so probably pretty used to broken apart forts and the like. It’s an apt name for the site we use for war games.

Five minutes into setting up I dropped a hammer on my foot, which was pretty embarrassing even if it didn't break anything. Mel insisted that I let Bobby patch it up for me. Being a legacy of Vejovis, she had a natural affinity for medicine, and seeing as we had war games that evening she actually fixed up the bruise completely, rather than soothing it enough that I could still train on it. For those of you wondering, that really is our usual system - you get fixed up to _training fitness_ not _absolutely fine thanks!_ , because we’re soldiers and “won’t always have the luxury of excess medics and medicine.” _Boy_ do you curse that particular Legion mindset when you’ve gotten bruised all over during hand to hand combat and feel like flinching every time someone so much as _breathes_ on a bruise. Those are days when you give offerings to Epione, Vejovis’ wife and the literal goddess of painkillers, and hope she’s in a friendly mood.

Anyway, thanks to Bobby and her grandad’s passed on blessings, my foot stopped swelling in under fifteen minutes - by which time the fort building was really progressing. Bobby also remembered my bruised collarbone from a few days before, and sneakily patched that up for me too. Jack hadn’t even allowed me to put ice or something on it at the time, seeing as it wasn’t broken - harsher than even the actual rules, seeing as they were guidelines on excessive use of healing powers and godly medicine, not on small practicalities - and had since turned a lovely mix of purple and yellow, like some kind of weird marbled plum and vanilla ice cream. It faded quickly away to nothing under Bobby’s careful attentions, taking with it the dull ache and sudden twinges whenever I moved too quickly. I relaxed a little, tension I hadn’t been aware of slipping away. Going into war games with anything less than full starting fitness is just asking for trouble.


	4. III. Battle stations - mind the elephant!

“Equipment check!” The parade ground bellow of Third’s centurions, speaking in synchrony, echoed through the defences. My heart rate leapt, and Bobby and I traded grins. That was the last chance call for us; it meant prep time was almost over and the games would soon begin, and that if we didn’t have any gear, now was the time to run and fetch it. I stood and did a spot check - helmet: check, armour: check, sword: check, shield: check. Sorted. Bobby was good too, and we high fived and went to see if anything needed doing. Mel was talking to Anya and Alexei, who were rushing to put the final touches to the last few traps, and I wandered over to see what was going on.  
“No, you _absolutely_ will need proper boots not sandals. You need the ankle support if you fall or stumble, and the protection of something over your foot. They may not stop a sword, but it’ll make someone standing on your foot in a shield line a lot less painful.” She turned away, running a hand through her long hair and absently sweeping it back into a ponytail, and caught my eye. Anya was biting her lip, glancing between Alexei and Mel, unsure what she needed to do most. “Jase! You got a job?”  
“Nah, just finished being fixed up by Bobby. Need me to go fetch stuff?”  
“Yes. Anya, where’d you leave your boots?”  
“Foot of my bed.” Mel nodded at me.  
“Third on the right. Fast as you can, buddy.” I dumped my own gear with them, and legged it. Well, until I was out of sight, and then I did something that _technically_ I wasn’t supposed to. See, I’d found out when I was small that if I tried, I could do something _really cool._ My father, Jupiter, is the got of the sky, and turns out that comes with some benefits for his kids, because I can fly. It’s seriously the _best._

Problem was, I wasn’t officially allowed to do it because of a _few_ incidents involving unplanned landings and getting stuck in trees. It didn’t always work perfectly, but whatever. It was quicker than running. I couldn’t manage anything long distance, but I managed a few hops, jumping and gliding in leaps and starts. I went back to running as I approached Camp, because I didn’t want to get lectured or, worse, be disqualified from the Games. Anya’s boots were where she’d said, and I grabbed them and started to head back to the Field of Mars. I had to make a diversion to avoid the amassing First and Second cohorts, who were doing their own final equipment checks and getting into formation. Rather than going down the _via Principalis_ directly towards the Field of Mars, I crossed the thankfully empty principia to leave through the Decumarian Gate. The fact that the other team were already onto final formation ready to march meant I really had to hurry if I was going to get there first and be in place with any time to spare. I was glancing back to check they hadn’t left, and therefore whether I’d be able to risk some low level gliding again without being spotted, when I noticed Louisa slipping out of the armoury and striding briskly towards the via Principalis to join her cohort. I hesitated. Probatio weren’t allowed in the armoury unsupervised, under _any_ circumstances. After a heartbeat, I shrugged, and ran back towards the Field of Mars. Honestly, I was chafing under that rule too, after years of being allowed into the armoury at will.

I reached the new fort exactly two minutes before First and Second made it to the Field of Mars, armour gleaming in the early evening sun. This was a summer battle; we’d fight either until the flag was captured from the fort - granting my team a loss, and the others a victory - or until either one team had no fighting members left or the sun set. That last was what my team were aiming for, because realistically we weren’t going to get all of First and Second down and out without a miracle, and we were forbidden from praying for divine intervention - not that we’d get any. The gods had way more important things to do than watch us play at war, and even if they were watching, there would be no point. We were _Romans._ Victory meant nothing if the gods had to directly intervene and save us from lifting a finger for it. You’d be celebrating the gods deciding you were totally incompetent and in need of saving. Godly _blessings_ , now they were something to be proud of. A direct godly blessing means a god doing something to help you along, because they think you’re doing something important. Giving you some kind of gift or skill boost to use. They don’t happen very often.

Anya just had time to swap footwear and stow her sandals somewhere in the hopes that she’d be able to retrieve them later before the praetors took to the skies on the backs of giant eagles, accompanied by the loud bugle that signified the start of the games. We ran to our battle stations with the rest of the Fifth. The fort had been built in a kind of spiral - the aim was to buy time, with layer upon layer of defences to slow the First and Second cohorts down in hopes that we could win by the clock, with a thick outer wall that would have to be breached first up, complete with watch towers and fighting platforms for deterrent. Hannibal’s happy trumpeting echoed across the field of Mars as he spotted his newest plaything. Hannibal sure loved trampling stuff. 

Unsurprisingly, the Fifth were in the places most likely to get hit first, but not in the most strategic locations - with a couple of key exceptions. Alexei was sat twiddling his thumbs with the flag guards - the absolute final line of defense - in case one of his traps needed urgent adapting. He was probably filling the time by booby trapping the flag itself, so that whoever actually grabbed hold of it would get one final piece of resistance once we were all down and out. Anya kept pace with me as we charged up the stairs to meet Mel, who was directing our portion of the defences. She tried to summon a smile for us, but I knew her well enough to know it was false. And why wouldn’t it be? We knew we were being thrown under the elephant as expendables, and she’d been dealing with it for a long time. She was also the one who would have to look after us all once we were injured, and make us train when we were declared fit to do so, no objections. Being a centurion can suck, sometimes. Peering over the rim of the wall, I could see the Second and First cohorts beginning with a pretty standard opener - pincering round the entire fortress, slow and steady, keeping their distance. Investigating and searching for weaknesses. I gritted my teeth. They’d be looking for a long time. Mel whistled under her breath, and I elbowed her gently. She grimaced and stopped, looking embarrassed. Shehad a habit of slipping into vague whistling and humming whenever she was concentrating, and had to work not to when on missions or quests. Monsters are good enough at finding half bloods without making noise to alert them to your presence. 

First and Second came to an agreement, and begin to advance in earnest, shields braced into a close formation against the expected retaliation: water cannons. We were predictable, and used them, because as you might guess, the further from the walls you can keep the other team, the less likely you are to get stabbed. Third were in charge of the cannons - they didn’t trust any of us with them, of _course_ \- and they picked their targets. I had to hand it to them, they knew what they were doing. They timed blasts to strike as lines were advancing, aiming for any small gaps in the advancing shield walls. At first they seemed to be ineffective, causing the line to brace and pause, but then Anya had an absolute brain wave. She convinced the cannon nearest us to aim for the ground ]in _front_ of an advancing line under fire from another cannon, rather than going direct for the people as usual. As soon as both cannons let up - they’re only capable of short blasts, not like hoses - the line advanced and promptly several Legionnaires slipped in the mud, having been busy concentrating on resisting the first blast and not noticing the second. Instantly the cannons on our wall were focused on the gaps, and the archers - that’d be all of us up on the wall - picked up the strategically dotted around bows with quivers of blunted arrows. They bruised like nobody’s business, but you couldn’t take an eye out with them, and that was what mattered most. We used real swords not training ones, but the rules were clear about actually causing fatalities. We were expected to be better than that.

The block of Legionnaires on our side of the hexagon were crumbling. Once the water cannons get into the _tortuga_ they’re difficult to deal with. It’s one crowded mess of water spraying at high pressure into your face and up your nose, combined with suddenly slippery ground and the added bonus of your teammates slipping and sliding into you. The middle of the tortuga caved in as the legionnaires there fell, causing an absolute pile up. I spotted Jacob trying to extract himself and start the regroup, and fired an arrow into the back of his helmet. From experience, that startles you badly, and he didn’t disappoint - he fell straight back over, landing heavily on one of his pals. I grinned to myself, and made a mental note to remind him of it the next day. A cheer went up from our side of the wall as the block either got to their feet and retreated or stayed put, groaning as they waited for the eagles to swoop down and airlift them off of the battlefield. The giant eagles of the Twelfth Legion make even the biggest fully mortal birds of prey look like little bluebirds: they can _comfortably_ carry a six foot Legionnaire built like a pro football player in full armour, which comes in very handy during war games.

Of course, being the Fifth, nothing could keep going right for us. Anya cooly shot a retreating Legionnaire neatly in the throat as they backed up, and had another arrow on her string before he was done stumbling backwards, couching and retching. I shuffled a little out of her way when she jerked her head, to give her the clear shot while I scanned for my next target. She loosed again, but this time I didn’t have time to watch someone fall and wonder whether Anya might be a relative of Apollo, because she yelped and dropped to her knees heavily. I crouched next to her, my own bow and arrow forgotten.  
“What is it?” She gestured helplessly at her leg, face ashy pale. I glanced down and swore loudly enough to get Mel’s attention. Mel had been a Legionnaire long enough to know what that kind of response meant in war games, and gave an ear splitting whistle to get the attention of a medic and eagle.

An arrow was sticking out of Anya’s leg, blood seeping around it and over her thigh, beginning to drip onto the wooden floor already. She was biting her lip and starting to cry, shuddering in shock and with the effort of not making too much noise. I knelt next to her and braced her with a shoulder.  
“Don’t worry, Mel’s getting the medics. They’ll have you fixed in no time, okay? Bet you’ll be thrashing me n’ Pablo in tomorrow morning’s run, same as usual, no problem.” She whimpered as she tried to move, but was trying her best not to scream or anything. She didn’t want to distract anyone, or maybe she just thought that people would think she was a wuss if she let on she was in pain. The eagle plummeted down to us with a suddenness that made me jump, and I helped Mel load Anya onto the stretcher in its talons. I gripped her hand briefly as she whimpered again. “I’ll give you guys a lift, okay?” The eagle understood as well, another perk of being the child of Jupiter, and I braced my feet on the walkway, taking a deep breath and giving a mental shove as I exhaled. The eagle spiralled up on the false thermal, bearing my friend away to safety. Blood dripped through the stretcher as they went, splattering over my hand on the side of the wall. I picked up my fallen arrows, trying to wipe the sticky liquid off my hand in disgust, and paused. We all, no exceptions, used blunted arrows. Blunt ended arrows that - at least the ones the Legion made - would give you a bruise the size across of a grapefruit, but would only just pierce wet cardboard, let alone human flesh. Either someone had forgotten they had a sharp arrow in their quiver, or they’d decided that some rules were made for breaking. I saw red, and the next thing I knew, Mel was gripping me by the shoulders to keep me from jumping off of the wall and charging the nearest bunch of First cohort.  
_“I know._ But leave it for now. The medics will get the arrow out. We’ll deal with it when the games are _over_. Focus!” She was right, and I took a deep breath. Then I picked out a target, and aimed for the throat. I missed, but I had plenty of targets to practice on and all the motivation I needed.

“BREACH! BREACH! BR-ggh.” We ran for the stairs, dropping through hatches into the main fort, shouting out the message to anyone who’d missed it. I wondered which of the Third’s sentries had been silenced while reporting the breach, and tried to put it from my mind. I’d find out later, in the final tallies. The hatches were closed with a regular line of thumps. Someone cursed from outside - I recognised Pablo’s voice and winced. The hatches were on automatic, one of Anya and Alexei’s ideas to avoid one being left open accidentally. There was the sound of a brief skirmish, and then the whoosh of collapsing walls. There was a thud on the wall outside, and someone knocked on the hatch two along.   
“C’mon! I’m not spider man you know!” Someone forced the hatch open again, and in slipped the wiry form of Pablo, a nasty orangy bruise spreading across his face. He grinned crookedly at us as the hatch closed again and was sealed shut. “I had the _slight_ advantage of knowing when the walls were going to turn into flat pack mode. A third of Second are under a pile of kindling. Nice one, Anya!” He looked around, and the grin faded. “Hey, where is she?” My blood began to boil again, but Mel caught my eye and shook her head slightly.  
“Injured, airlifted off. She’ll be fine.” Pablo grimaced. “She took out a couple of them with some good shooting first, though.” He nodded.  
“Well, that’s something for her.” We started towards our next posting.

We were into the spiral defences now. Alexei and the other planners had designed the fort so that the entire outer wall was on hinges. Once the first breach was made, we’d had a fixed time period to get off the walkway and drop down into the fort before they collapsed, concertina style, shattering apart in strategic places to make a jagged mess of broken up timber that would be awkward to maneuverer through, and would have buried as many enemy soldiers as possible. It had, as Pablo said, been a stroke of genius on the part of Anya. The rest of the building was mostly Alexei’s brainchild, probably envisaged in a sleepless night at some point in the last year. It spiraled in towards the flags at the center - it was unbreakable rule that the flags had to be in the fort itself, with an actual access route, and couldn’t be concealed - with the walls between each coil being trapped so that the First and Second would hopefully have to fight their way through each coil rather than breaking through directly. We were near the entrance, of course, which _just happened_ to be where the First and Seconds tried to break through the walls. Luckily, we knew what was coming. Unluckily, we had to not let on until the last minute, because we wanted them to spring the traps. At the last minute we fell back into a tight shield formation, and even so some of the goo splattered over us. I gagged and spat, having remembered to close my eyes but not to stop breathing through my mouth. Next to me, Pablo wiped gunk away from one eye, which was starting to swell and water.  
“Gods above, that burns.” He hissed, and I nodded back, wishing I had something to get rid of the taste. We weren’t allowed real poison or anything like that, but we were allowed a certain degree of external resources - and it’s really amazing what you can do with large amounts of chilli powder and a few other choice ingredients. We backed up, still in formation, keeping wary eyes on the coughing and gagging enemy. The first line fell back, warning the next wave what had happened. There was a brief reprieve while they consulted, which was soon over. We fell back a little as the second wave formed up and began to advance, spears dropping and starting to probe between chinks in our shield wall. Three of the Fifth went down, replaced immediately as we continued our strategic retreat, interspersed with periods of false resistance to keep up appearances. We passed a subtle mark on one wall, and I kicked it as I went by. On the other side, Pablo did the same. It was timed _perfectly,_ and just as the middle of the advancing pack drew level with the checkpoint, oil sluiced down onto the floor in front of and around them, making them slip into a pile up. It was beautiful.

Unfortunately, that was the last victory of the day for the Fifth, because at that point the First’s ballistae came into play. The mass of stones crashed into the wall next to us, splintering the wood. It took a minute to understand what was going on, and then it clicked. They must have been building the ballistae _during_ the games, because I hadn’t seen any on the via Principalis. From the shocked expressions on the faces in front of me, I guessed that it might even have been a spur of the moment plan, because even the other members of the First and Second seemed confused. I didn’t blame them - ballistae were the serious guns of war games, capable of not only smashing walls but also people. It meant that whoever was firing them was betting the walls would take the brunt of things and result in lots of buried Legionairres from both teams, with no major casualties. And _that_ meant they were gambling with the wellbeing of their own cohorts, not just us. Hannibal bellowed somewhere outside, and I swear I could hear the displacement of air from the next shot - or maybe I could feel it. I didn’t know if my father’s gifts to his offspring included air missile detection; this suddenly seemed like an oversight in my education. In the moment before it hit, I recognised Octavian in the lines ahead of me, and for an instant our eyes met as I shouted a warning to everyone to brace. He was looking green, and braced with the girl next to him as the ballista hit.

The wall _crumpled,_ and we had nowhere to go but down with it. Laying dazed under the broken fragments, I distantly felt another shot coming, and it hit the wall above me, triggering the traps. Luckily for us, they went inwards not out - but I could hear members of the Third waiting on the other side of the wall shout in shock as they were caught. I don’t know how long it was before the collapsed walls were lifted off of us. The fighting had continued, but it was clear even as we were being lifted out that the Firsts and Seconds had won, though some of their own Legionnaires weren’t too happy about some of their strategies. It was rather heart warming to hear them complain about being used as a wave of sacrifices as part of a strategy, though I doubted many would remember the feeling next time it was _them_ coming up with the strategy. Sitting glumly in the first aid tent, I glared at the still blue sky. The sun was just starting to set, but we were nowhere near darkness, and that meant nowhere even near the Fifth and Third having won. It had been going so _well._ It had even felt like we might have had a chance, for a few glorious minutes.

Before I could get too entrenched in bitter thoughts, Jacob came over and clapped me and Octavian on the shoulders, nodding at Pablo, who waved weakly back while obediently chewing ambrosia. The taste of my square was still lingering in my mouth. The literal food of the gods, ambrosia has amazing healing powers for demigods, so long as you don’t eat too much and combust, in which case you become a very healthy pile of ash. It’s like a square of jello, and it tastes neither like jello (usually) or medicine. It tastes like _home_ , like everything good in the world, everything you want to hold onto and live for. For me, it’s brownies. Those amazing, New Rome bakery super secret recipe brownies I’d thought my father maybe wanted an offering of, gooey and chocolatey, still warm from the oven, with a hint of coffee smell just floating around them from the rest of the bakery. Those brownies never failed to make me feel good. They were the food of afternoon walks back from senate meetings with Mel when I was a kid, when I used to sit on the fountain outside and swing my legs, bored, waiting for her to be done with all the boring meeting stuff involved in being centurion just for the sake of getting to eat those brownies fresh, rather than waiting for her to bring them back as a treat. They were the food we went for on weekend walks in New Rome outside of the holiday season, and for my birthday Mel never failed to take me to the bakery and stick a candle in one. Brownie flavored medicine - it had its downsides, but somethings about being a half blood were pretty good, and that was definitely a highlight. 

“Guess you’re glad I got you out of the action early, huh?” Jacob glared at me, but without much heat.  
_“Dis,_ that was _you?_ Your aims gotten better, kiddo. I’ve got a dent in my helmet to fix up now. Eh, I will admit I'm not sorry to have missed the collapsing walls. _Either_ of the collapsing walls.”  
“Yeah, at least _we_ knew our wall felling was going to happen.” Jacob pulled a face and Octavian made a noise that was a cross between and snort and a snarl. I wondered if it had been a bit too soon, but I knew that we wouldn’t be given any time to lick our wounds before being mocked for chalking up yet another loss. It was rare for any of the Fifth to get the chance to rub salt in other people’s wounds, and I took the chances I got.

Gradually, everyone gathered back into cohorts - well, everyone who was still on the field, rather than having been airlifted off to the infirmary - to hear the official announcement of the results. Rich’s eagle swooped down to perch on the specially built perches alongside his fellow praetor, Violet. He was grinning widely. Rich had been in the First cohort, and he was always extra pleased when they did well.   
“So, after some admittedly very strong defensive action by the Third cohort, with some support from the Fifth, it’s a pretty clear victory to the First and Second cohort.” The First and Second’s standard bearers waved the flag aloft, while the Fifth muttered unhappily. Alexei was just glaring, fists clenched, at the smirking Third centurions. Mel didn’t even look surprised, and I guess she wasn’t. _Of course_ if anything good had been done, it had been the work of the Third not the Fifth. Pablo hissed in anger next to me.  
“No mention that it was a Fifth probatio who had one of the most successful ideas, of course.” He muttered it quietly enough that only I heard. I thought of Anya, in hospital before her plan was even put into action, and anger and sorrow collided into a heavy weight in the pit of my stomach. I remembered the leg incident, and nudged Mel. She just raised an eyebrow at me, and I realised that of course I was just being impatient. She knew what she was doing, biding her time until the right moment came up.

We didn’t have long to wait.

“Keeping the honour of Rome aloft -”  
“Some _honour._ ” Mel didn’t often raise her voice, and she was regarded as a generally soft touch centurion. It was why she often took care of beginners, who needed a little patience when first learning to hold a sword without stabbing themselves in the foot. But when she _did_ lift it into battleground mode, dripping disdain, _boy_ did people listen. There was a stunned silence, in which Alexei shifted to stand more clearly alongside Mel, giving a clear message: that this wasn’t Mel losing her temper, this was both the officers of the Fifth declaring a public grievance. Violet turned to us, while Rich gaped, looking rather like a fish out of water.  
“You have an objection to the actions of the First or Second cohort? Do you feel that they have not acted within the spirit of the children of Rome?”  
“At least one member of the First or Second was armed with sharpened arrows, causing severe injury, _of which I alerted the relevant officers at the time_.” The challenge in Mel’s voice was clear. She was really angry, even angrier than I'd realised, to be publicly challenging the praetors. Violet hesitated, glancing at Rich, who seemed to be about to find his voice. He was more hard line than her, and more likely to overlook such an incident and allow the games to continue. I’d been so distracted at the time that I hadn’t even noticed Mel sending a message with the eagle to the praetors. Mel was walking a dangerous line here, publicly calling attention to the fact one of the praetors had effectively allowed potentially life threatening behaviour to continue. Well. More life threatening than was officially permitted, anyway.

Whether Rich would have backed down and disqualified the other team - unlikely - or at least covered up with some kind of declaration that the _individual_ responsible would be found and suitably punished, remains a mystery, because it was at this point that Hannibal charged.

He bowled through the remains of the Third, bellowing and trumpeting madly, eyes rolling. Legionnaires broke ranks and ducked out of the way, and the path would have been cleared - there really aren’t many ways of stopping a rampaging elephant with a long life expectancy - when something odd happened to Rich’s eagle. Violet’s lifted off just like usual, spiraling lazily upwards. Rich’s tried to, but there was a moment of - of - I don’t know, wrongness, like a cloud passed over the sun when there were no clouds, and instead of lifting gracefully into the sky, it flapped and screeched and fell, landing heavily half on top of the praetor. A purple streak ran forwards from the retreating First, grabbing Rich round the waist and dragging him away from the floundering bird, a tightly clutched _pilum_ coming up to point unwaveringly at Hannibal. There was another odd push, and Hannibal twitched away from the spear at the last moment, even though he’s been trained to trample past such things with the aid of kevlar armour. His foot landed firmly on the struggling eagle’s wing with an audible _snap_ , before he stampeded off, leaving bloody footprints behind. Rich was gasping and groaning. At first I thought it was just shock, but then he tried to scramble to his feet and fell back with a cry. Louisa crouched next to him, supporting him and calling for the healers. Bobby shook off her shock and own dazed feelings from the collapsing walls and ran to help, along with the other medics present. Mel started calling orders to the Fifth, telling us to keep ranks and stay back, then paused to gently push me forwards.  
“Best go get that eagle, Jase, before it savages someone.” I nodded and ran to help.

Like I said, as part of being Jupiter’s son comes the ability to talk to, and broadly understand, eagles. Well. Definitely the giant ones; I’ve never been allowed to test it on the regular fully mortal kind. The other Legionnaires were doing their best to keep out of the way of the frantic bird of prey, well aware of the kind of damage even a swipe from one of those powerful wings could do, let alone the vicious talons or beak. One of the medics started to snap at me to back off when they heard me approach, but Bobby hushed them and told them who it was. I slowed into a cautious walk as I drew close to the eagle.  
“Hey there, buddy. It’s okay.” It screeched abuse at me - nothing that I can repeat without having my mouth washed out with soap, but I guess if you try to imagine what _you’d_ say to some kid coming up to you and saying ‘it’s okay’ when you’ve just had one limb crushed by an elephant, you probably won’t be far off. “Yeah, it hurts, I know. But we can help, okay?” I kept talking, saying nothing much, until it started listening and calmed down a bit. Honestly, I don’t know if that was due to me or just shock overtaking it. I drew closer as it stopped thrashing, to peer at the wing. I had to work to control my gag reflex - throwing up in open wounds isn’t really recommended - and gently petted the eagle’s head. “We’ll get you fixed up, no worries.” There wasn’t much I could actually do, but I kept the poor thing calm until the medics had Rich fixed up enough to be transported, when Bobby joined me and started humming a prayer to Epione and patching up the eagle. As he was lifted into a seated stretcher under another eagle, Rich held up a hand for silence, clearing his throat. Violet handed him her water bottle, and he took a mouthful, before handing it back with a brief thanks.

“For an act of distinct bravery, I - _we_ \- the praetors of the Twelfth Legion, declare Louisa Wells to have earned her place in the Legion as a Legionnaire of Rome. Augur!” He coughed again, starting to shake from the shock of everything. Octavian hurried forwards, and motioned Louisa to hold out her arm. He held a hand over it, murmuring an invocation to the gods. A flicker of pain passed over her face as the marks appeared on her skin, and my own tattoo seemed to twinge in sympathy, even though I’d received it so long ago that there was no way it could still be sore.

As Rich was airlifted away, Louisa turned to return to her cohort, aglow with pride. Her eyes fell on me, and for a moment, I swear she turned pale and scowled. Then her features smoothed out, and her lips twitched back into something that wasn’t quite a smile anymore, but more of a smirk. I didn't know why, but I knew it meant nothing good for me.


	5. IV. The not so dream team

This time, I guessed that I was dreaming almost immediately. I stood in front of my father’s temple once again, and the white marble already glowed orange. I didn’t want to turn around, but I was buffeted by strange, unfriendly winds that forced me to turn on the spot. New Rome collapsed in on itself in front of me, and I couldn’t seem to move, to shout, to pray, to do _anything_ to save my home. I noticed this time when I fell to my knees. Somehow the nightmare was even worse this time, because I knew what would happen, and in some strange way, because I knew I was dreaming and still couldn’t wake up, and that meant that this was a demigod dream, not a normal nightmare.

This was… a message, perhaps, or a forewarning. But I’m a son of Jupiter, and that doesn’t come with the power of foresight - that’s a rare trait of the children or legacies of Apollo, like Octavian, who in addition to being a Legionnaire is the Twelfth Legion’s augur. 

Nothing woke me as the temples crumbled and blew away in the bitter wind, and I found myself stumbling through the ruins and ashes of New Rome. Despite the fires that had been burning, it was icy cold, reaching into my heart and freezing it - or maybe that was just the sight of my home destroyed. It took a moment to realize that the loud roaring noise I could hear wasn’t my blood pumping in my ears as I stumbled and sobbed and chocked on ash, looking for anyone, any _thing_ , that hadn’t been taken away from me, but a giant tidal wave, of all things, bearing down upon the sheltered valley in which New Rome and Camp Jupiter had been built. It crashed down over me, buffeting and twisting in all directions, and when it receded, as suddenly and inexplicably as it had appeared, there was nothing left behind but me. It was as though New Rome had simply been washed clean off of the face of the earth.

I woke up crying this time, not shouting, which at least meant I didn’t wake anyone. On the other hand, it meant that Mel wasn’t there to soothe me back to sleep, and I didn’t want to go ask her for the sleeping oil because I’d had a bad dream. Five year old me had never hesitated; eleven year old me had a little more pride and dignity. Besides, if I told her I’d have a nightmare she’d want to hear about it, and I didn’t think I could face describing it. Instead, I tossed and turned for the rest of the night, not quite able to shake the cold, hollow ache that seemed to have been left behind in my chest, and once again was almost glad when the wake up bell went. _Almost._

The weather was much better for this run, and Anya actually _was_ back, which surprised me. I’d assumed I was telling her a white lie during the games, trying to keep her calm while the eagle collected her. She gave me a tired smile as we set off.  
“Morning, guys.”  
“Hey girl. How’s the leg?” Pablo fell into stride next to me. Despite the attention of the medics the evening before, we were both pretty stiff and sore. Anya shrugged.  
“They decided it was serious enough to warrant full healing, so just a bit bruised and sore now. Nectar and ambroisa are amazing, aren’t they?” We both nodded, jogging along and starting to relax into the pace. Few people seemed to be taking the run as a challenge this time, which was pretty standard after war games, unsurprisingly. Louisa ran past us with a couple of others from the First.  
“Probatio tags looking nice and shiny there, Fifths. Looking after them so they last the whole year?” She ran on with her friends, clearly determined to be some of the few really taking this run seriously, sniggering. Anya and I had both ground to a halt in surprise, and Pablo had to prompt us to start running again. 

“So, what actually happened last night? Mel filled me in a little when I got back this morning, but there wasn’t much time. Louisa lost her probatio status?” Pablo nodded.  
“Yeah, pretty impressively. Hannibal went on a freak rampage, and she dragged Rich out of the way, else he would’ve been squished like a bug. Dunno why the eagle didn’t just take off as normal, though. Violet got out of the way in less than a second.”  
“Something weird happened.” I frowned, remembering the strange push in the air around the giant bird. “There was something _stopping_ him from taking off.”  
“What was it?” I shrugged embarrassed. Neither of them looked convinced, so I dropped it.   
“C’mon, we should pick up the pace a bit if we want time to eat breakfast.”

Louisa’s jibes about being probatio had been bad enough when she was one too; now that she no longer had to wear her little metal tag and could call herself a Legionnaire, they got a thousand times worse, and more frequent. I just didn’t get it - she wasn’t even obliged to _talk_ to me, so why couldn’t she just let me be if she didn’t have anything nice, or at least interesting, to say? Even worse, if I said or did anything about it, then _I’d_ be the one to get into trouble, because I’m a Roman, and apparently my skin should be like armor and I shouldn’t let these things bother me. Roman stoic-ness will be the death of me, I swear. Anyway, I was doing okay at ignoring it, right up until the mission. Usually missions are a great thing. A mission - definitely distinct from a quest, more on that later - is when the praetors (usually) decide that some task needs doing, and send a group out to deal with it. Missions mean real world experience, cool stories to tell, a chance to test yourself in the real world and best of all, a chance to get out of Camp Jupiter.

Don’t get me wrong, Camp Jupiter is _amazing_. I grew up there, and I loved it. I loved the Fifth’s barracks, with everyone’s bunk somehow modified, from Alexei’s clockwork train alarm complete with tea set, to Dakota’s much more tame posters. I even liked the way there were spare bunks, set up as couches so that we could lounge around and play cards or talk in the evenings. The mess hall, where I’d been taught how to use a knife and fork, and the armoury, where I’d run around knocking everything over and driving my supervising Legionnaires to distraction. I loved the walk to New Rome, the shops and fountains. And as I may have mentioned, I loved the bakery by the senate house, and the owners like me too - they always give me bonus brownies, or add extra marshmallows to my hot chocolate. I guess they developed a soft spot for me when Mel used to leave me there during meetings, with colouring sheets and crayons, kept quiet and happy by the smell of chocolate and coffee and knowing I was home and safe. 

But it can be stifling. I went to school in New Rome - and that’s a tiny, local run thing, with only a handful of students. You’re officially not allowed to leave Camp without permission, and there’re some serious punishments if you break that particular rule. And being a son of Jupiter, I came with extra-high risk of monster attraction, so Mel had had to fight tooth and nail every time she wanted to get me out for a bit, even just to go shopping or something. So all things considered, I should have been stoked to be sent out on a mission, especially because as a probatio you’re even less likely to be picked for one because of, y’know, the whole lack of experience and training leading to 200% increased liklihood of death or extreme maiming thing. 

In fact, I _was_ excited when I first heard, for all of two minutes. Mel collared me at dinner and told me the praetors wanted to speak to me after the meal, and she raised an eyebrow at me in that parental way she had that said “What have you done now?”. I shrugged back at her, torn between being excited because it _might_ _just_ be a mission, and panicking that maybe someone had spotted me gliding on my way to and from war games. One I figured would be great, the other would probably result me being sewn into a sack of angry weasels for a few hours. Yes, I _did_ say angry weasels. It’s even less fun than it sounds, which really shouldn’t be possible. Roman punishments can be a bit odd, but you get used to it after a few years.

So I went along, as instructed, to the praetors’ office after dinner hour was over, innocently unaware of the horrific bombshell about to be dropped on my naive head. Violet called me in as soon as I knocked, and gave me a wan smile. I instantly felt guilty. _Everyone_ knew she and Rich had been dating for going on three years, and it hadn’t crossed my mind at all that she might have been pretty shaken by the whole thing. Honestly, I’d mostly been feeling increasingly annoyed about the whole situation simply because of Louisa’s aggravating smugness, and because it had interrupted the whole thing with Mel calling Rich out on letting the games continue when forbidden live weapons were in play. So far as I knew, nothing had been done about that - so by now, working out who had been carrying sharp arrows rather than blunt would be neigh on impossible.  
“Jason, take a seat.”

“Thanks, Vi. Um. How’s Rich?” She smiled a little, amused. Rich and I had never exactly gotten along, for various reasons, but Vi and I had bonded a fair amount over the years. I couldn’t exactly pop away home during term time, and Violet had stopped going home for the holidays soon after realising she was trans - at least at Camp, we could just point out to anyone who questioned it that she had the goddess Diana's blessing, so who are _you_ to argue? - which meant she'd been around full time for four years, which is plenty of time to get to know one another.   
“He’s feeling a lot better, but it was a nasty set of breaks from falling off of the eagle, and they’re keeping him in the infirmary for a while longer - he broke that leg badly last year as well, remember? So they’re having to be extra careful. And it’s not like he’s well rested at the moment with all of the admin we’ve had to do, so there’s that… Sorry, Jason, you aren’t here to listen to me complain about being praetor.” I shrugged awkwardly, fighting the temptation to kick my legs against the chair.  
“You are here, in fact, to receive your official instructions for a mission I require you to undertake.” My heart started hammering away in my chest so hard I thought it would break free. This was a Big Deal. Plus it meant I wasn’t in any trouble, which is always a bonus.

Violet grinned as I sat up straighter.  
“Sorry, Jase, it’s not the most thrilling of jobs, just to warn you.” I actually squirmed on my seat in excitement, because what did I care if it was the mission equivalent of going to pick up milk and a paper? “I was going to deliver _this_ myself this week, but with Rich out of action for a bit I don’t think I can spare a day to get it done.” She gestured to a neat parcel wrapped in Camp Jupiter purple that lay on the desk. “It’s a shipment of ambrosia for Tara. She’s got a changeover in San Fransisco, but doesn’t have time to come into Camp and collect it.” What she didn’t say was that Tara was the kind to take offense if she didn’t get a suitable delivery committee - she’d been the female praetor before Violet, and that position came with a _lot_ of honor and respect. One of the praetors themselves would be acceptable - and a good chance to catch up briefly with an old friend, of course - but which Legionnaires to send instead would be a puzzle.

“I’ve done a lot of thinking, and picked out three of you who I think are suitable.” She grimaced a little, probably having had plenty of more urgent things to do. “I know you’re familiar with the area, thanks to Mel.” We shared a brief smile. One of Mel’s most successful tactics for getting me out of Camp Jupiter for a few hours had been insisting I come on the minibus into town to collect any returning Legionnaires at the start of the summer or winter training season, supposedly to keep her company on the drive. I was very familiar with the train station.  
“So, who else is going?” My mind was flicking through possibilities. Mel was out: she and Tara had never gotten along. In fact, it probably wouldn’t be anyone from the Fifth; I was the exception because I was a son of Jupiter, and therefore held in the mind of Tara a certain degree of inherited respect, even if I had totally embarrassed her when I first arrived by choosing the Fifth cohort over the First.   
“I decided that the most appropriate would be Jack and Octavian.” I wasn’t _thrilled_ at the thought of spending time with Jack, but I generally didn’t mind Octavian too much, except on his most pompous days. “However, Octavian is no longer able to go due to having fallen ill this afternoon. So I spoke to Jack, and he suggested that Louisa should go instead.”

And that was the point that my previously thrilled heart crashed into my boots. A whole day with just Louisa and Jack? Now _that_ was a nightmare.


	6. V. No running on the platform!

I started out the day determined to not let my poor company get the better of me: we met after the morning run and breakfast at the Decumarian Gate, where Violet officially entrusted the package to Jack for delivery. It felt weird to have not changed into my armour after breakfast, ready for training. Instead I was just in shorts and a camp t-shirt, rocking the shorts and trainers look. It may not be the most stylish, but you don’t want to risk facing monsters in sandals, and _definitely_ not in flip flops. The others were dressed similarly, and we could pretty easily pass for three teenagers out for a walk or something. In fact, Louisa and Jack even looked like they could be related, with the same dark skin and eyes. I didn’t know where Louisa was from, but based on her accent I’d bet it was somewhere in Louisiana, same as Jack, which helped with their appearance of being related. So I guess we looked like two friends and one older sibling, which meant we shouldn’t catch too much attention. I settled my backpack more comfortably on my shoulders as Violet went over our instructions one more time. It was pretty simple: Get to the train station and meet Tara on the platform, give her the parcel and attached letter. Say hi, wait for her to get on her next train out of politeness, and head back to camp with _absolutely no diversions_. The last bit was a downer, but oh well. We’d still get a chance to wander around the city a bit on our way there and back.

“Okay, you’ve got everything you’ll need?” We all nodded. Given how long the task was going to take, we really didn’t need most of what we had with us, but Roman Legionnaires follow the Boy Scout motto: Always be prepared. Literally, I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve been made to write that out or recite it when I forgot something or didn’t have enough emergency supplies on me. So for our one day trip into the city? We were all carrying both _denarii_ and mortal money, a small stock of ambrosia and nectar for absolute emergencies, water bottles, emergency rations, and super small pack blankets. Oh, and we all had weapons, of course. Those can pose something of an issue in a mortal context, but the Mist helps. The Mist is this weird thing that clouds mortals’ eyes from seeing what’s _really_ there. Take my sword, for example: I had it wrapped in a thin towel, and to any mortals it would probably look like a cricket bat or something for playing on the beach. The Mist is freaky, but great. 

Vi waved us off, then headed back to supervise training. The praetors don’t usually run sessions themselves, but they’ll randomly pop up to oversee and join in, checking what’s going on and keeping the centurions on their toes. Jack led the way, even though all three of us knew exactly where we were going, and I found myself trailing slightly behind both him and Louisa, as they struck up a cheerful conversation that I had absolutely no input into. I gritted my teeth to keep from sighing aloud. I was a Roman. Romans do not complain. It wasn’t far to the bridge over the Little Tiber, the main route out of the valley Camp Jupiter and New Rome were hidden away in. We weren’t allowed to use one of the Camp vehicles because officially none of us were old enough to drive, and Vi hadn’t thought it worth organizing an escort given how short a trip it was, and how little notice there was. Plus the walking was probably good for us, or something. Terminus was waiting for us, somehow giving the feeling that if he’d had feet, rather than a pedestal, he would’ve been tapping them.  
“Dawdle, dawdle… look sharp!” We snapped out salutes, and I hid a grin. Terminus is the guardian of the city limits, but he also insists on checking any authourised departures from camp. Kinda like a Roman version of passport control, I guess. “Letter from the praetor?” Jack extracted the official note of mission from his pocket and held it up for Terminus to read - unfortunately, Terminus’ statue lacks arms, so he’s just a head and torso. He forgets a lot of the time. He peered at the letter, and gave a brisk nod.  
“Excellent. You! Tie back your hair!” Louisa jumped and pulled a face, but did as she was instructed, tugging her handfuls of tiny braids back into a ponytail. He insisted on giving us directions from the camp, as though we didn’t know to turn right and walk for two minutes to get to the bus stop, and vanished in a puff of smoke as abruptly as he had appeared.

It didn’t take us long to reach the bus stop, and we waited only ten minutes before it arrived. Sitting on a mortal bus was an odd feeling - it was rare for me to be surrounded by people who were in the dark about the continued existence of the Roman gods and the monsters of myth and legend. The journey was quiet, and I spent most of it staring out of the window and wishing that I’d thought to bring a book along with me, or something. The other kids my age on the bus were all listening to music or playing on their phones, and I had a moment of extreme jealousy. Mobile phones are a _big_ no no for half bloods. They act like a major flare, letting every monster for miles around know where you are. The centurions all get one, a real old fashioned Nokia brick that can practically be stomped on by Hannibal in a bad mood and still work, for use in absolute emergencies. Jack and Louisa were still happily talking away about something they did in training the afternoon before, so nothing I could join in with. 

So I was the only one who noticed when someone a bit _off_ got onto the bus the stop before the city. None of the mortals noticed, and even Jack and Louisa paid no attention. That’s the downside of the Mist - it can hide things like our weapons, or make godly situations explained away in a mortal fashion, but it also shields monsters from the notice of mortals, and sometimes even demigods. In fact, Louisa glanced up when they got on, but didn’t seem to notice anything out of the ordinary, turning straight back to her conversation. I couldn’t even say what about the new passenger it was that threw me, except that it set all of my Lupa trained Roman/wolf senses tingling. Romans are advised to go with our instincts on this stuff. I watched the mysterious passenger, who was decked out in full length tracksuits and a hoodie with the deep hood up, despite it being boiling sunshine outside, as they shuffled into an empty seat. So far, so innocent. I watched as keenly as an eagle for the rest of the trip, but they did nothing suspicious. Until we got off the bus in the city center to walk the short distance to the station. As we passed, I saw them sit up straighter with a jerk, head turning towards us. Under that hood I caught the gleam of an eye - just the one. But I was being pushed off the bus by a swarm of people; this was the stop closest to the train station, after all, and was one of the most popular. The bus doors slammed shut and the bus pulled away before I could even grab Jack and tell him.  
_“DIS!”_ Jack jumped, and Louisa just looked at me weirdly.  
“What!?” It’s pretty hard to shout in a whisper, but Jack managed it. “What do you think you’re _doing_!?”  
“There was a cyclops on the bus!” Jack huffed and rolled his eyes.  
“No, there _wasn’t._ C’mon, Grace, stop fooling around. We have a mission here.” Louisa giggled.  
“Hey! I’m telling you, the guy in the hoodie only had one eye! I saw!”  
“He wasn’t even looking at us. You probably only saw one of his eyes, _probatio_.” Louisa sounded so smug that I would’ve punched her except I was too busy worrying about the cyclops on the loose. I’d never had to deal with a cyclops myself, but we’d covered them several times over the years in monster training sessions, and Mel had a genuine horror story of one of the early times she had to deal with them, which had given me nightmares ever since and a healthy dose of caution around them - which was of course why she’d ever told me in the first place, after I’d made the mistake of finding them amusing the first time I’d heard of them. 

But whatever I said, I couldn’t seem to convince the other two that there had been a cyclops at all, and the more they looked at me like I was being an absolute idiot, the less certain I was. But the feeling of dread in my belly just wouldn’t go away.

Jack practically had to drag me along to the station, and I finally gave up protesting, because the cyclops could be literally anywhere by this point. Louisa was rolling her eyes and muttering angrily about being slowed down by newbies - which was pretty out of order considering I’d been training for, y’know, actual _years_ rather than a few weeks. Someone bumped into her as we entered the station, sending her flying and scattering the contents of her poorly fastened rucksack over the floor. Jack cursed and lunged to grab her bag of first aid stuff before someone trod on it.  
“Grace! Go find out which platform Tara’s train is going from and meet us back here!” I nodded and sidled off through the crowd, leaving them to pick up Louisa’s stuff. There was a crowd in front of the departure board, so I scrambled up on top of a statue plinth to peer over people’s heads, scanning for the right train.   
“Hey, you! Kid!” It took a moment for me to register it was _me_ being shouted at. “Get down from there!” I couldn’t spot whoever was talking, but two station security staff were turning towards me, and scowling. I looked back at the departures desperately, finally spotting the correct train and the platform, and jumped down from the plinth just as the staff came within arms reach of the other side of it. I slipped between businessmen in suit and scurried away, keeping my head down.  
“Platform 2!” Jack and Louisa took off immediately, with that purposeful walk that says ‘I know _exactly_ where I’m going, thank you, no need to ask me any questions’ Unfortunately they went the wrong way, neither having arrived by train before, so I had to turn them around quickly. 

We made it to the platform without any trouble, and stood scanning for Tara. At first we weren’t worried; despite my hesitating after getting off the bus, we’d arrived in plenty of time. As it got later and later, we all grew more and more nervous. Like most praetors, Tara was good at being places on time. It’s not a role for those who can’t make it to things exactly when they say they’ll be there, if only because part of the job is punishing people for being tardy so you have to set a good example. Jack and Louisa were peering at the clock and trying to work out how long we had, and therefore how much we should be panicking, when two things happened in close succession: I noticed a station security guy giving us a curious and slightly concerned look, and a horrible thought occurred to me. It was taking Jack and Louisa a while to work out the time, because like most demigods, they have dyscalculia. It’s a Roman thing. I mean, the modern Arabic numerical system is pretty different from the ancient Roman, which is what half blood brains tend to be hardwired for. More to the point, I remembered that _I_ have dysclculia, tending to default to Roman numerals, and that I’d been pretty close to panicking when looking at the platform number because I knew I only had a few seconds left before the security guys collared me and started asking awkward questions such as “So, where are your parents?”. I swore internally.  
“Oh _gods_ I’m sorry. Not platform two. Platform _eleven._ ” I said it just as Jack muttered the time limit.  
“Seven minutes left.” We didn’t even waste time exchanging glances, just turned and ran as fast as we could. 

Seven minutes to run nine platforms was totally _doable_ , given the level of fitness we were all kept at by the training regime at Camp, but we were supposed to be doing the exchange in plenty of time for Tara to get on the train, settle down, all that stuff. We were level with platform nine when a security guy grabbed Louisa by the arm and gestured angrily at Jack.   
“No running on the platform! Honestly, can’t you kids read?”  
“We’re late for our train!” He huffed in annoyance, still not letting go of her arm.   
“Well, you should have arrived on time. Where are your parents, then?”  
“We’re meeting them at the other end.” Jack shifted. “Could you let my sister go, please? We’re in a hurry.” The guard was having none of it - he probably dealt with teenagers the whole time. There wasn’t anything Jack could do either, because attacking mortals is hardly considered acceptable. The station guy started giving a lecture, and I realized suddenly that he wasn’t talking to me at all. He hadn’t even noticed me - I must have been out of his line of sight when he collared Louisa, or maybe he just thought I looked less like trouble than the other two. Being as subtle as I could, I backed up into Jack, and thank the gods he must have gotten what was going on, because didn’t react when I took the parcel out of the zip pocket on the side of his bag.

I quick-walked towards platform eleven as fast as I could, trying to avoid attracting any notice, feeling like my heart was bursting with urgency.   
“The train on platform eleven will be departing in two minutes…” I tuned out the rest of the loudspeaker message, and decided that I was going to have to risk running again - no way was I going to walk five platforms in that kind of time. I dodged between people and hoped that I didn’t slip and fall. I started praying in my head as I went. Apollo and Diana, now would be a really great time for me to have a level up on my running speed. That’s a hunting thing, right? Fortuna, please please smile on me, or at least don’t scowl. Mercury, trains are supposed to get delays, right? It's a defining feature! Vulcan, a minor engine hiccup, if it’s no trouble at all, would be great right now. _Please please please…_ I didn’t really expect any help, of course, but I figured it didn’t hurt to at least ask. Of course it meant that if I actually pulled this off I’d have to leave them all offerings, just in case.

The doors to the train were just closing as I skidded onto platform eleven. I spotted Tara hovering by the closed door to first class, which thankfully was at my end of the train, frowning anxiously, and from somewhere found a final burst of speed just as another shout echoed across the platform.  
“NO RUNNING ON THE PLATFORMS!” Someone blew a whistle to let the driver know it was good to go, and I risked a push of air to let me jump a little further than should have been possible, landing on the step by the door and shoving the parcel through the little open window across the top. I saw her catch it as I dropped back immediately, panting and gasping, and the train pulled out. It registered that I’d probably just gotten myself into some _serious_ trouble with the station guards, and I turned to face the music, frantically wondering how I was going to get out of this one. I had a phone number for my “parents” - actually a hot line to the praetors’ office - for such situations, but it was a last ditch thing. Giving a number meant traceability. It meant someone had to come pretend to be my parent(s). It meant lots of hassle. 

So I was pretty surprised to find that there were no station guards anywhere nearby. Lots of people were staring at me, and a concerned woman who could have been my granny started towards me.  
“What on earth do you think you were doing young man? Are you hurt?” I shook my head, and made a rapid shift into Adorable Cherub mode. It was less effective now that I was eleven than when I’d been, like, five, but it could still work like a charm.   
“No, I’m fine. I do gymnastics. My sister left her medication by mistake, and she gets really _really_ ill without it, so I had to get it to her.” I blinked up at her innocently, wondering whether I should say something about not wanting to let my sister die, or whether that would be laying it on too thick. “But I should really go back to my parents and tell them I got it to her.” I smiled, and turned to hurry back to where I’d last seen the others. As I did, I spotted someone at the edge of the crowd in a dark hoodie, glaring at me from his single eye. He turned away, and I instantly decided I wasn’t letting him go a second time. 


	7. VI. Monster mess

I gave the concerned lady one more smile over my shoulder, and started to hurry back the way I came, keeping my eyes on the rapidly disappearing back of the cyclops. I followed him past a few cafes, grinning to myself as I realized he was headed straight for a dead end, with nowhere else to go. Slinging my bag round so I could detach my sword, I swung into battle mode and dropped it carefully at the side of the thankfully empty hollow between a cafe and newsagents. The cyclops at the other end cursed and turned. his eye widened as I uncovered my sword, Imperial Gold glinting in the harsh station lighting. Blessed in the days of olden Rome, Imperial gold had various special properties, the main one being that it could actually hurt monsters.

“Hey there.”  
“Hello.” I shuddered a little, because it was speaking with Mel’s voice. That’s what makes a cyclops so tricky to deal with. They can reach inside your mind, pick out voices that will affect you, trick you into confusion. My grip tightened, and I shifted my feet to get a better footing, breathing deeply and evenly. I don't know if I looked calm; internally I was going _do not panic. Mars, please don’t let me panic_. _C’mon, Grace, you can do this._ The cyclops interrupted my internal pep talk, which was probably for the best.  
“Can I get by, Jason?” This close, I could see that the black hoodie had monster head outlines all over it in dark blue - I spotted a cyclops, a minotaur, something that could have been a siren. Emblazoned across the front was “Monsters United” in curling script.  
“No can do, buddy.” It was dawning on me that I shouldn’t have waited until I was certain of being out of sight, because this thing was a) the first monster I’d faced in totally out of control or supervision conditions since I was… very little, if ever, and b) a _lot_ bigger than me. Now, I’d been training against people bigger than me my whole life, so that wasn’t necessarily an issue. But it did mean I would have been way better off just stabbing the thing in the back, Roman honour be damned.

“Please, Jason, I just want to get past.” It wasn’t Mel’s voice this time. It was a girl’s voice, young, and I half knew it. I shuddered and took a step back. I didn’t know why it had such an effect on me, but the cyclops was quick to take advantage. Years of training kicked in, and I recovered enough to take a wild swing that came close enough to force it back. With a snarl of rage, the cyclops took a swipe at me, which I ducked. The second blow wasn’t a complete surprise, but this time I didn’t dodge far enough, air leaving my lungs with a whoosh as it just clipped me. Grimacing, I swung the sword round as I regained my footing, and suddenly there wasn’t a cyclops any more, just a pile of dust. And a battered hoodie.

That’s the best thing about monsters - very little clean up required. They disintegrate into ash if you get a killing strike in with a weapon of Imperial Gold. It’s in short supply, but it’s vital if you’re a half blood like me. I stowed the sword back on the outside of my bag, neatly disguised again, and tucked the hoodie into my bag. It was kinda gross, but hey - victory spoils are victory spoils. All in all, I was feeling pretty good, even if I was starting to shake as the adrenaline wore off. I’d just taken out a full grown cyclops on my first official mission, unaided. Like, that’s a pretty big deal. And we’d gotten the parcel to Tara, so the mission had been successful.  
“Grace you _moron_ what are you doing you absolute idiot _I’m gonna kill you._ ”

Jack and Louisa were standing at the entrance of my little alley, looking about ready to murder me, and I remembered that they probably hadn’t even known whether I’d made it to the platform or not.  
“Hey guys! I got to the train just in time, she got the parcel -”  
“Yeah, and you drew loads of attention. We’ve got to split, _now._ Why didn’t you regroup in the meeting place?” Jack grabbed me by the arm and started pulling me out of the station towards the buses, while Louisa scanned for approaching security staff. “Loads of people on the platform saw your stunt on the train, they’re all talking about it, we should have been gone the instant you were done _showing off._ This is a mission, not a joy ride! For gods sake, _probatio_ , this was not the time to decide you wanted to grab a coffee!”  
“I wasn’t showing off! It was the only way I was going to get the parcel to her! And I was going to find you guys, but I saw the cyclops again, an’ I couldn’t just let it go! It would’ve hurt people!” Jack groaned and told me to _shut up._ I was gobsmacked. I’d just dealt with a monster while they were busy being scolded by station staff! The bus was due to leave a few minutes after we got on, and in that time I was quite clearly told not to talk, and to stay put and not cause any more trouble. It was a very uncomfortable trip back.

“…and then probatio Grace, after pulling this stunt with the train door, rather than meeting us back at the assigned point decided to go on a diversion, gods know why.”  
“I told you why!” I couldn’t keep myself from interrupting. Rich raised an eyebrow at me from his seat, still looking pale and in pain, and I spluttered into silence. Mel was in the praetors’ office too, along with Alexei, which was freaking me out. That meant that their presence had been requested, probably by Jack, before we gave our official report. It meant that I was in big trouble. Like, giant sized trouble. Louisa snorted, but didn’t say anything. Jack rolled his eyes.  
“Oh yes. _Apparently_ a cyclops got on our bus. And somehow, both myself and Louisa - the _qualified_ Legionnaires - didn’t notice this. And then the _same_ cyclops that nobody else could see was on the platform! Shouting train security quotes at Grace, worrying about his health and safety, as cyclopses are known to do, and the _probatio here followed it and killed it.” Rich was clearly unimpressed, and even Violet looked doubtful. Mel and Alexei just traded looks, and I felt like I was shrinking. Everything was going wrong. Finally, Violet_ turned to me.  
“Grace?”  
“There was a cyclops. I don’t _know_ why the others didn’t spot it, they were talking and maybe they just didn’t notice. I saw it on the platform and I couldn’t just leave it, could I?” I had to fight to keep my voice steady, exhaustion and embarrassment combining with nerves to make me feel shaky and like I wanted to cry. But I couldn’t do that, not if I hoped to keep any dignity in Camp. Breaking down sobbing in the praetors’ office would both give everyone reason to scoff at me, and make it look like I was relying on sympathy rather than honesty to get by at Camp. Violet’s expression gave nothing away. She turned to Louisa.  
“Wells?”

Louisa shuffled a little on the spot, shooting me a quick glance that made me instantly on my guard. It looked like she was being almost… apologetic? Nervous? Whatever it was, all my instincts screamed at me that she was faking.  
“I… I don’t think there could have been a cyclops. We would have _noticed_. Maybe with the whole platform fiasco, Jason was just on edge and got confused?” She shot me another of the fake apologetic looks, and I realised with a start that she was playing the praetors, and doing it _well._ She was making it look like she didn’t want to be saying this and dropping me in it, but that she had to, because she just couldn’t lie to the superior offices. And they were _buying_ it.

I gaped like a fish out of water for a moment.  
“I didn’t get _confused!_ There was a cyclops, and I managed to stop it, I’d have noticed if it was just a person, because I would’ve had to explain why I’d just _stabbed_ them!” I should point out at this point that Imperial Gold doesn’t hurt mortals, fortunately. Only immortals and half bloods, lucky old us. So if I _had_ accidentally stabbed a mortal, they probably would’ve just been confused, if they had even noticed, not caused the death of an innocent bystander. “I stabbed it, it crumbled away, and left its jumper behind!” I dragged the relevant article out of my bag, glad now that I’d bothered picking it up. Louisa laughed, apparently back to her usual self for a moment.  
“Gods, Grace, this is getting a little childish. So you thought to take a jumper on a mission with you, big deal.” 

And that’s when things got… weird. Because that jumper was _so_ clearly not my size - it would probably have fitted Jack, who was going on eighteen, while I was eleven, and scrawny (though if you tell anyone at Camp that I admitted that, I’ll have to kill you, mortal or not). But there was this moment when everything _twisted_ a little, as though the ground had shifted underfoot without shaking everything, or - I don’t know, but it made me feel a little sick. And suddenly everyone was buying that the jumper was _mine._

Well, to be fair, not quite everyone. Mel was still frowning a little.  
_“Is_ that your jumper, Jase?” She was speaking quietly, hesitantly, as though she didn’t know the answer. But that was ridiculous - Mel had bought most of my clothes with me, I did my laundry with her out of habit, she saw me literally every day of my life. She knew all of my clothes, down to being able to pick out my socks from those of the rest of the Fifth guys’.  
_“No.”_ I was both trying not to cry and not to throw up, and starting to panic. I didn’t understand why none of them would just believe me. She turned to the praetors, still looking confused.  
“If it isn’t his jumper, then where did he get it from?”  
“Oh, come of it, Fifth. We all know that’s Grace’s jumper, he wears it all the time.”  
“What? I didn’t even have it before a few hours ago! I’ve never _seen_ it before today!”  
“Grace, enough!” Rich had finally gotten fed up. “Just… stop.” I kept opening and closing my mouth, wanting to object and not knowing where to _start._  
“But if there was a cyclops…”  
“Mel, we already know there wasn’t one.”  
“ _Yes there was._ ” Mel tilted her head a little, listening to me even as she chewed her lip.

“We know that two people didn’t _see_ a cyclops.” Even she didn’t sound totally convinced, and I think I would have run away there and then, because if Mel didn’t trust me there was no hope for me, except I knew if I moved a muscle I’d crumple down into a sobbing ball on the floor.  
“Two _Legionnaires_ didn’t see a cyclops.”  
“Jase has been here longer than either of you.” She was still speaking slowly, and there was a weird hitch in her voice that scared me. What she’d said scared me, because it was not a Mel thing to bring up. It was exactly the kind of thing Mel had drummed into my head _not to say_. I got enough accusations of special treatment without actually demanding it myself. “I don’t find it hard to believe he could have spotted something you missed.” Jack actually started forwards, furious, looking as though he was going to punch her or something. Louisa was biting her lip, keeping up her sudden act of nervous rookie who just wants everyone to get along.   
“I said _enough!_ ” Rich was really furious now, and Violet was looking similarly displeased. She took over from her partner once everyone’s attention was back on them and it looked like there weren’t going to be any fistfights.

“The mission is _over._ It was successful overall; due congratulations and rewards to the participants.” She gestured to three purple envelopes sat neatly on the desk, official camp logo embossed in gold. She turned to me, expression neutral and closed off. “However, we cannot condone risky, attention grabbing behaviour in the mortal world. Nor do we permit disobedience to the senior members of a party, and no Roman should attempt to garner honour through _lying_. Probatio Grace, I do not judge your actions serious enough to merit discharge from the Legion. However, you will undertake punishment work for the rest of the Camp summer season - an hour of work each evening after dinner. Report to myself or Rich here each day to be assigned your task.” She handed over the envelopes. I took mine with shaking hands when Mel nudged me, feeling numb with shock.  
“Dismissed.”


	8. VII. Wildfire, teenage style

One of the absolute _worst_ things about Camp Jupiter? You’ve got a couple of hundred teenagers (mostly) jammed together in close quarters, so anyone’s business is everyone’s business. We’d arrived back at camp after dinner, due to being delayed leaving the station thanks to the cyclops (or me, depending who you asked) and traffic, and left our meeting with the praetors at, like, eight thirty. Mel left me face down on my bunk and went to go find me some food. She’d been gone less than ten minutes when Pablo came in. He hesitated, before coming over to my bunk.  
“Jase? You… um, you okay?” I groaned incoherently. I didn’t want to tell him. I didn’t want to tell anyone, but I knew they’d find out. You can’t have punishment work every day without your friends asking why.  
“Look, Jase… don’t sweat it, okay? Remember _my_ first mission? I totally screwed up! Like, no worries. Bet the next one will be a piece of cake.” To be honest, I hardly heard the second half of his sentence, because I felt like someone had poured icy cold water over me. _He already knew_. Fifteen minutes, tops, and people already _knew._ I groaned again, dragging the pillow over my head, wishing that I’d never have to leave and face anyone. Seriously, I was praying to Pluto to just open the ground up and send me to Tartarus, because even that had to be better than the amount of scorn I was going to get.

Pablo got the message, because he just gingerly patted me on the shoulder and went to his own bunk, humming in an awkward ‘I’m just going to make noise like I’m not paying attention to you lah di dah’ kind of way. I was grateful, but it was buried beneath a whole heap of burning shame and anger and gut wrenching sadness, so I maybe didn’t appreciate his attempts to be subtle as much as I could have. I’d lost the battle not to cry on the walk from the praetors’ office, glaring at my feet and hiding between Mel and Alexei, hoping that no-one else would see. They’d both been kind enough not to mention it, just exchanging a look after we reached the barracks, at which point Alexei had left me to Mel’s care. I could hear more people trickling in, and for a moment wished I’d taken Mel up on her offer to crash with her, before remembering that the other girls would also be in her barracks.  
_“No no no! Leave him be!”_  
“But I wanna hear about it!”  
_“C’mon, dude, he’s had a rough day.”_  
“Ah, so he screwed up. We’re the Fifth, that’s our _job.”_  
“Dakota!”  
I groaned and curled up more, clutching the pillow even more tightly. At this point, Alexei stuck his head in.  
“Hey gang! Was wondering if you slackers were back. C’mon, I’ve set up a new game and I want people to play with.” The room emptied again, with some protesting and insistence from Alexei and Pablo. 

It had been a busy day, and between the excitement, adrenaline, and shock, I was an exhausted mess, so it’s no surprise that I fell asleep quickly. It’s also no wonder that I had nightmares.

This one started out in the station. I chased the cyclops, heart pounding. I cornered it, we talked, he attacked, I retaliated. Just how everything had happened earlier in the day. Only rather than turning to scattered dust, the cyclops fragments _glowed_ and caught fire, roaring up into an inferno that spread unnaturally fast. And suddenly other people were there - Jack and Louisa, but also people who hadn’t been in the station. Mel. Alexei, Pablo, Anya, Bobby. Octavian. Vi and Rich. The people who owned the bakery in New Rome. A girl a few years older than me, dark hair cropped short punk-style, almost a stranger - except her eyes were the ones I saw in the mirror every day, patches of the blue sky trapped in a face, and she had a name that was only just out of reach. I stretched out an arm to her as she stood, silent and grave, but the fire caught at her and she disappeared. They all did, winking into non-existance, until I was kneeling on Temple Hill, which was once again bare of temples, looking out over the empty space where New Rome and Camp Jupiter should have been. Louisa alone hadn’t been destroyed. She stood where my father’s temple had been, head tilted and an amused smirk pulling at the side of her mouth.   
“Little son of Rome - do you fall when Rome does?”   
It wasn’t her voice. It wasn’t a _human_ voice, I knew that much. It was ancient and… deep, somehow, full of power and age, and it was like ice pouring through my brain, so cold that I screamed with the pain. 

I jerked awake to Mel’s anxious face.  
“Jace! Thank the gods, I’ve been trying to wake you for going on five minutes.” I sat up shuddering. “C’mon, breathe now. You’re okay.” She clambered up onto the bunk and sat next to me, cross legged, on top of my old Superman bed sheets. She rubbed my back as I gasped and shook, until I calmed down enough to shrug her off, embarrassed. “Sounded like some nightmare. Here, eat.” She passed over a paper bag, and a new lump came to my throat. It was from the bakery in town - they had an outlet in the University of New Rome. She must have blagged her way into the university campus to visit the twenty four seven cafe outlet, just to get me something good to eat. And it was a part wasted effort, because I could only eat half the sandwich, the lump in my throat was so big. Mel didn’t seem to mind when I wrapped half of it back up in the bag.  
“You can eat it sometime tomorrow. It’ll last.” And then she opened the second bag, and took out two brownies. One for her, one for me. As soon as the first crumb hit my tongue, I was gone again, bawling my eyes out like a baby. Ambrosia tastes like those brownies for me; so these tasted like ambrosia, but they couldn’t fix what was wrong. Mel stayed, letting me just break down between bites. I must have looked a mess, but she was probably used to that from me. She was still there a few hours later when I dozed back off to sleep, thankfully into dreamless oblivion for the night.

There were twenty one blessed seconds when I woke up when I felt okay. For those twenty one seconds, I just stared up at the ceiling, feeling peaceful, if a little annoyed that I’d woken up before the bell and so lost sleep. Then I sat up to peer at the clock and check whether or not it was worth trying to sleep again, and my eye fell on the cyclops’ hoodie hung over the bedpost, and everything from the day before came crashing back. I flopped down with a groan, arm over my eyes. If my _own_ cabin had known the previous evening without myself, Mel or Alexei telling them, then I could guarantee that literally everyone would have heard by now.

When the bell rang, a few minutes later, I seriously considered just hiding and refusing to get up. It was only the thought of being actively dragged out by someone that got me up, feeling like I was on my way to my own execution. Death by humiliation, it’d be great. They’d be mocking me for it while I slouched in Asphodel, the underworld destination for the mediocre, who deserve neither punishment or praise. Most of my cabin mates wouldn’t meet my eyes, and I honestly didn’t know whether they were giving me space or judging me.

Anya was waiting outside the boy’s barracks, and fell in on one side of me, Pablo on the other. We usually ran as a group, but this felt different. It felt like I was being escorted - or maybe like they were my bodyguards. Mel caught my eye and gave a tight smile, the one that meant _this is going to hurt_. We’d hardly gone a few meters when the first catcall came.  
“Hey, _Grace!_ Pick up the pace! You’re going to miss your _train.”_  
“Yeah, which platform is it on again?”  
I didn’t even look to check who it was, hopelessness forming a pit in my stomach. I couldn’t even be bothered to argue, to defend myself, because I knew that there was no point. I was just going to have to be Roman, and put up with it.  
“Oh, no, guys, he isn’t trying to catch a train. He’s spotted another _invisible cyclops.”_  
“There _was_ a cyclops.” I muttered it to myself, and if either Pablo or Anya heard, they didn’t say anything.

I’d thought the probatio ribbing was annoying at the time, but this was _so much worse._ If it had just been the platform thing, I could have dealt with it. That had been my mistake, even if it wasn’t really my fault in some ways - I didn’t actually ask for numbers to swim around and dart out of my reach like fish in water, I didn’t ask to default to Roman numeral, but it was something I knew could happen, that I had to keep in mind. It was the cyclops thing, and the fact that people thought I’d made it up. Worse was the reason they’d thought I’d made it up _for._  
“Y’know, probatio, an act of honour isn’t _everything.”_   
It was lunchtime, and Anya had dragged me to the pavilion. She, Pablo, Mel and Alexei had spent the whole day forming ranks around me, trying to shelter me from the worst of the never ending jibes. I dropped my fork in surprise as the words sank in. I looked up into the mocking gaze of Victoria, a great great great granddaughter of Venus in the First cohort. She had her nose screwed up like I’d rolled in something gross and absolutely stank, and was staring down it at me. Admittedly, she’s so tall that she has to look down on most people anyway.  
“Wha- I didn’t - I didn’t even think -”  
“Yeah, we know you don’t do that, probatio. Just accept that you’re not the star of the show and _grow up._ ” She left, and it occurred to me that she’d actually been… angry? I looked around my friends, bewildered, and they were all watching me cautiously.  
“What was _that_ about?” They didn’t have time to answer before the bell went to send us to afternoon training, and I forgot to ask again.

Bizarrely, it was Octavian who answered my question, a few days later. That evening’s punishment work was Temple clean up duty - lots and lots of dusting. Octavian was around because he spent a lot of time up on Temple Hill, reading the augeries in search of quests or advice from the gods. He was also officially supervising me. He was also one of the two people in the First who didn’t seem to be a combination of amused, disgusted and furious with me. Both he and Jacob had been warily ignoring me, which was almost worse than them joining in with the taunting would have been. At least then I’d have known what they thought of me.  
“So, Grace. Claiming you killed a cyclops isn’t quite your… style.” It was Octavian’s Official Tone, the one he’d learnt as a little kid being required to do an adult’s job. Augurs aren’t common; there’s only ever one or two round at once, because it’s an unusual gift of the children or legacies of Apollo. He sounded utterly disinterested, but he was watching me keenly, weighing my reaction.  
“I did kill a cyclops.” I was already so fed up that I couldn’t even put much force into my voice. He wasn’t going to believe me, anyway.  
“It’s very convenient, that Jack and Louisa weren’t there.” I shrugged.  
“They were held up.”  
“You know, it’s rather unusual for two probatio to achieve acts of honour within a week of each other, or even for it to be suggested.” It hadn’t occured to me the day before, but it dawned on me that it _could_ look as though I’d been jealous of Louisa, and wanted to earn my way out of the rank of probatio as well. That was why the First were really _annoyed_ at me, not just finding it hilarious. They’d decided I’d been trying to show up their recent Legionnaire acceptance.  
“I’m not lying. It happened.” Octavian paused a moment, then nodded ever so slightly. If I hadn’t been looking out for his reaction, I would have missed it. It was scarcely more than a dip of the chin, but relief filled me. At least one person thought that I was telling the truth. Maybe because Octavian, for all of his faults - and _boy_ could he be annoying - held New Rome and the Legion above all other things, and could scarcely conceive of doing anything that would bring dishonour to the latter. Or maybe he just knew me better than that, but there were plenty of people I’d thought fell into that category who’d somehow joined the group delusion.

“The augueries have been even more clouded of late. I am getting… concerned.” I got the feeling that Octavian had been wanting to say this the whole time. Maybe he’d even informed the praetors that he needed someone to clean the temples deliberately, to make sure we could talk. I sat back on my heels and stopped pretending to do anything but pay attention to our conversation.  
“What?”  
“They are always mysterious, as one would expect from the Gods. But now they are… garbled, in a way that is not normal. I am worried that something has happened, and we don’t know about it.” I fiddled with the edge of the duster.  
“There was a… thing, in the praetors office, the other night. Something twisted everything, and suddenly everyone believed that the cyclops’ jumper was mine.” Octavian raised an eyebrow, considering. “Like… almost like when someone twists the Mist, to convince mortals they haven’t just seen a monster, or that we’re carrying musical instruments rather than weapons.” The eyebrows dropped into a furrow.   
“Mist _manipulation?_ That would be bad.” My mind was racing.  
“Something similar happened after war games, too. There was this push in the air, and the eagle couldn’t fly.”  
“I didn’t notice anything.” I shrugged.  
“Well, I _am_ the son of the sky god. I’m going to be more sensitive to stuff in the air, aren’t I? You always know exactly when the sun will rise or set.” He nodded, a little reluctantly.   
“Perhaps. But back to the praetors office. Someone was manipulating the mist inside the office? Grace, I don’t think you’ve thought that one through, actually.”  
"Have you got any _other_ ideas what would be able to mess with people that much? The question is who, and _why._ " My thoughts leapt to Louisa. She’d definitely been manipulating the praetors, though I had the sense not to say that to Octavian. He took being in the First really seriously, and I needed to keep someone on my side who believed me rather than just looking out for me. Octavian’s thoughts went in a totally different direction.

“Trivia is goddess of the Mist.” I honestly didn’t think. I’d grabbed him by the front of the shirt and was taking a swing at him before he’d closed his mouth, because Trivia was Mel’s mom, and there was _no way_ I was letting an accusation like that slide. He must have known he’d get that reaction too, because he moved quick enough to get the knife he uses to sacrifice teddy bears under my chin before I could actually hit him. “Well, it clearly wasn’t you, was it? Violet and Rich wouldn’t, what reason would there be? Jack never got the hang of it.” He smirked a little. “And Louisa’s never been taught how to. It hasn’t come up in training yet, either, so she probably doesn’t even know it’s possible. I _suppose_ it could have been Alexei, but can he manipulate mist at all?” I shrugged, reluctantly letting go of the augur. He was right that Alexei couldn’t manipulate the mist, though he used to be able to do a little. Since his accident, he’s been completely unable to - too many nightmares and issues dealing with the way the world was, without trying to change how other people saw it.  
“It _can’t_ have been Mel. She wouldn’t want to. I’m not even sure she _can_ control the Mist. I’ve never seen her do it, anyway.” I was trembling with anger. Octavian jerked a shoulder.  
“Maybe. I suppose you’ll just have to look out for anything odd, won’t you?” He turned back to the alter, our conversation clearly at an end, picking up a stuffed bear to begin his next round of reading the augeries. “Oh, and Grace? I won’t mention that to the praetors, but you may want to control that temper of yours.” He can be _so_ irritating sometimes.

Whatever Octavian had said, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Louisa must have been the one manipulating the Mist. It was the only thing that made any sense, though I couldn’t explain even to myself how she would know how to do so. I just knew that Octavian was wrong: it simply _couldn’t_ have been Mel, which only _left_ Louisa.


	9. VIII. Just call me Jason (Dis)Grace

Despite my certainty, I could find nothing to back my opinion up. I just remained on edge and constantly fed up with being mocked, taunted, and generally the butt of every joke. Pablo and Anya did their best to keep my spirits up, and Mel tried, but there was something bitter in my chest whenever I looked at her. She’d _doubted_ me, and I couldn’t quite dislodge the slightly disappointed expression she’d worn when she was checking whether I was lying or not. She seemed to get it, and let me be. 

Even the other members of the Fifth couldn’t seem to let it go, though at least there was something friendly in their approach. We’d all been the laughing stock of the other cohorts often enough at some point or other. It still grated, but at least it felt more like people joking about something too soon, rather than delighting in my disgrace. Oh, and _the puns._ The name Grace is a curse, I’m telling you. Half the legion were calling me probatio at every opportunity, and the other half just Dis-Grace. I spent most of my days with my head down, staring at my feet, constantly reminding myself not to get into more trouble by responding. Louisa was the worst. All of her pretense at being so sorry to be dropping me in it was gone after the first day, and she seemed to be making an actual effort to find me and mock me. She made no secret of the fact she thought I’d been trying to - to _show her up_ , either. And, gods, by the end of the week I was ready to kill the next person who told me to stop thinking I was a _superhero_. I knew that already, thank you very much.

Thing is - and this is a big thing - thing is, even though I’d been in trouble before, I’d never been… well, no matter how much it pains me to say it, in disgrace. I’d never done anything really _bad_ , not by demigod standards. Sure, I’d messed up the armory more than a few times, snuck into other barracks to play pranks, had the various flight incidents. But there’d always been a… sense of amusement under the annoyance. Like, kiddo, you’re in trouble, but overall we think you’re good. I’d never actually been scorned, had usually had roughly fifty fifty admonishments and compliments. So I was already feeling so far down that I was practically in the underworld, saying hi to Charon and Cerebrus. And when the final blow struck… well. I broke.

It was a normal day. Up, train, breakfast, lessons, train, lunch. You get the picture. It was afternoon training, and we were with the First. I’d been dreading it all week, because you didn’t have to be a genius to know that wasn't going to be fun. And oh boy it was _not_. Jack was holding a major grudge; not only had I drawn attention, my platform mix up meant that neither he or Louisa had met Tara, and we must have looked shoddy. Not at all the super professional appearance we tried to keep up. So it was really being a _punish-the-Fifth_ session, which sucked even more than usual, because it was all my fault. We were doing individual vs. group fighting.

In other words, members of the Fifth were taking it in turns to get beaten up by groups of the First. Jack even made sure that I wasn’t against the group with Octavian and Jacob, who might have been reasonable, if not quite gone easily on me. It was the most obvious thing ever, he didn’t even _try_ to be subtle about it.  
“Probatios! Switch lines. Grace here needs more _experience_ against larger opponents.” Mel glared at Jack, but he ignored her. Technically he wasn’t doing anything wrong; it was a type of training we'd done before, it was a reasonable thing to get me to work on. Bobby squeezed my arm gently on the way past, which at least boded well for an unofficial healing if I got busted up too badly. Alexei was helping Pablo hold ice to a swelling black eye. Anya gave me a genuinely scared look as we traded over, with just a flicker of guilty relief, and I clung to that expression as I headed towards the real bruisers of the First cohort. At least she was with the marginally softer group, the only possible upside to the situation. I fought not to show my nerves as I approached the lounging line of Firsts. Louisa was in with them, as part of the whole ‘train with people better than you so you learn faster’ thing, with her older buddy Victoria, then it was the twins. Oh gods, the _twins_. They were kids of Mars, and even for members of the First, they were very good. Tough, fierce, and so rigid with discipline you could use them to build a bridge. They were also six foot seven, a head taller than Victoria, and built like pro football players. To round off my fluffy friendship line up I had Natalino, the short, chubby legacy of Somnus, who was easy to overlook and absolutely fatal if you did so. They only looked permanently half asleep, and had the knack of getting inside your head and making you feel super sleepy.

In short, I was absolutely doomed, and was partway through planning my funeral and wishing I had time to write a will when Jack shouted for us to begin.  
“Times a’ wastin’, my little lads and lasses! Get to it!” There was no mistaking the glee in his voice, but I didn’t even have time to be angry about it, because I was already being crowded. I’d been watching with the others, and knew that their strategy was both simple and effective. Form a ring around me, shields out, and advance, trapping me neatly between them. I had a sword and a shield. They _all_ had swords and shields. Once I was in a circle, it would be over, because I couldn’t guard my back at all. So I did the only thing I could: went for speed. I dodged and wove, and eventually dropped my shield because it was too cumbersome. I knew I’d probably regret it, but I was aiming to just prolong the time before I got caught, because as I’ve said, once I was caught it was over anyway, and it would just be a question of how long Jack wanted to laugh at me - or how long Mel and Alexei held out before risking disciplinary action and intervened. Honestly, it probably wouldn’t be that long, but it would feel it even if it was only a few minutes.

I skipped out of Victoria’s swing, ducked Adrian’s grab, stumbled as a loud yelp from Anya on the other side of the training ground distracted me, and found myself looking into Natalino’s lidded eyes when I glanced around. Things around me started fading out, exhaustion twining through my limbs. Natalino’s grin widened. They weren’t even in fighting stance, and some muddled corner of my brain protested at this. Then someone hit me over the head with a sword, and I went down like a brick, ears ringing from the echo in my helmet. Still feeling muggy, I had enough Roman Legionnaire instincts drummed into me to roll sideways, avoiding the shield that slammed down where my stomach would have been. Louisa was grinning down at me maliciously, but in a way she’d done me a favor. I may have been feeling groggy, but she’d gone for the attack before Natalino could really get to me. She’d actually woken me up a bit, and I struggled to my feet.

It was too late, though. The circle had closed in, and the phrase “kill ring” sprung to my mind with a sense of augur-worthy foreboding. 

I twirled on the spot like a demented ballerina in armour, keeping a tight grip on my sword. My shield lay a few feet behind Victoria, but it wouldn’t be any help anyway. A solid shove caught me between the shoulders, and I hit the floor again, curling into a ball almost immediately as a kick landed in my stomach. I was wearing armour, so it wasn’t as bad as it could have been and probably hurt the other person’s foot as much as me, but it still wasn’t comfortable. I managed to half get up, kneeling, and was knocked back down by a solid stab to the collarbone from Julian, one of the Mars twins. Things after that got a little blurry with pain, but eventually the sound of Mel shouting broke through the haze. Jack was arguing back, something about _toughening up_ and learning to take it on the chin. 

One of the First laughed, muttering something sarcastic about how this must’ve been how I dealt with the cyclops - curling up and whimpering until it died of embarrassment, and that was when I snapped. I kicked out, and luck was on my side because I caught Julian _solidly_ in the crotch. He staggered a little, and I got my feet under me, pushing off as hard as I could and calling on a blast of wind to help me rise. I shot out of the little group like a cork from a bottle, ignoring the angry shouting from Jack. I staggered on landing, stumbling away from my group of opponents on legs that trembled so badly I could hardly stand. I tried to bring my sword up again, into a defensive position, but my arm ached with bruises and I couldn’t manage it. The Fifth shifted, forming ranks around me, resigned to trouble but determined, and for a moment gratitude filled me like nectar. The moment was spoiled when Jack waved the advancing First group back with a look of disgust.  
“Session over. Well done guys. Fifth, _please_ could at least one of you learn to fight a little.” Mel and Alexei bristled on our behalf. “And if you could teach the probatio not to cheat, that would be _wonderful._ ” 

By the twelfth time someone that evening had inquired whether I was going to cheat and use my wind powers in the next war games, I’d made up my mind. 

I was getting the Dis out of Camp Jupiter, for good. 


	10. IX. A bid for freedom

I didn’t leave immediately, even though I wanted to just walk away and keep going. I’d be noticed, and stopped. Luckily, at evening muster, two things were announced: war games that evening, and that I was excluded due to punishment work. People throughout the cohorts snickered, but I was privately relieved. I’d have a few hours that evening when I could leave without anyone knowing. I kept my head down and looked embarrassed, which given how many people were jeering really wasn’t difficult.

I could hardly eat anything that evening, feeling like my stomach was twisting and grating inside me. Mel kept giving me these worried looks, and I couldn’t bear to meet her eyes. I wouldn’t be able to say goodbye, and that was the _worst._ But I couldn’t stay; I just couldn’t put up with it all any longer. First they wanted me to do something heroic. Then they didn’t believe me when I did. I was done being probatio (dis)Grace. I was going to be plain old Jason Grace, and not deal with any of this.

“Jase, are you okay?” I hardened my heart and took the chance. I shrugged, not looking up from my plate.  
“Not feeling great. I’ll be fine, Mel.” She pressed the back of a hand to my forehead, frowning slightly.  
“You don’t have a temperature… look, if you feel ill later, come find me? Even if it means skipping out on punishment work. I don’t want you to get sick.” I gave her a wobbly smile, and I think that’s what convinced her that I really wasn’t well. She didn’t push, but watched me like a hawk until I’d forced myself to eat something, and I could feel the weight of her gaze on my back as I headed over to the praetors’ office to receive my punishment duties for the evening.

There was a nasty shock waiting for me in the praetors office: Lupa was there.

She comes and goes as she pleases, and you can never be certain when she’ll be around Camp or not, despite the fact that she’s officially in charge. New campers always find it a little strange that there’s a giant wolf in charge of a Legion, but pretty soon it’s the least strange thing they’re dealing with. Her gaze, as always, seemed to both go straight through me and take in everything at once, and I couldn’t hold her eyes. I was too ashamed. I was leaving, running away. I wasn’t a Roman, not really, not at this point. She gave the sharp huff that expressed disappointment, and I cringed internally.  
“Grace.” I swallowed and turned to Rich, who I’d forgotten was in the room.  
“You will be on armoury duty for the first half hour of your punishment work. After that, you will return to Temple Hill, and finish cleaning your father’s temple. If I find that you have left, or snuck to the field of Mars to watch the games, the consequences will be severe. Do you understand?” I nodded silently, then saluted and went to the armoury.

Of course, Rich had deliberately picked out the _one task_ that would put me in everyone’s gaze: Legionnaires were in and out of the armoury to get equipment for the war games, and I was scurrying around sharpening swords, fetching spares, the works. The Fifth were among the last cohort to retrieve their weaponry, and the only ones not to mock me for having to sit out in _disgrace._  
“See you later, Jase.” I nodded at Pablo and Anya as they paused at the door, looking a little worried.   
“Take out an extra couple of the Firsties for me.” They both grinned and gave me a thumbs up, and hurried to catch the others up. My heart sank like it was made of lead. I was going to miss my friends. Soon after that, someone prodded me in the shoulder.  
“C’mon probatio disgrace. Scram. Time’s up, and I don’t want to be late to the start of the games because I had to wait for you to get out of the armoury because I drew the short straw and had to supervise you.” I glared at Louisa. I doubted she’d drawn anything; she’d probably volunteered to have the entire half hour to smirk at me, which was exactly what she’d done.   
“Yeah, yeah, I know. I’m going.” She made a point of waiting to let me out of the door first, just to really rub in the fact that I was lower ranked. As if that hadn’t been made clear enough already. 

I made my way out of camp and up Temple Hill. Camp itself was still too busy to pick up what little I could take with me, so I figured I may as well get one last good view of New Rome before I left for good. I didn’t bother cleaning the temple, though. There was no one there to supervise me, not even one of the fauns who hung around camp the whole time. Instead, I went into Mercury’s temple and burnt an offering on the altar - a chunk of chocolate, to be exact, praying for him to watch over me while I traveled. Then I picked a spot where I had a good view of Camp and sat watching until I saw the Third, Fourth and Fifth march out, on offence not defence this time. To be really safe, I waited until the eagles went up and the games began, before jogging back down the hill to camp to gather my stuff.

I’d decided what I was going to take. I didn’t have much _to_ take, honestly, but my focus was on speed anyway so I was going light. I just wanted _out_ already, cold and no longer fitting into the place that had always been home. So I shoved a couple of spare t-shirts and a pair of jeans into a bag, along with a zip lock bag of ambrosia and all the money I had, both denarii and mortal. I slipped back into the armoury on my way by, belting a sword to my hip. I’d disguise it later. For now, I had to get moving. Once again, I left by the Decumarian gate. This time I didn’t go to the bridge, because it was too close to the Field of Mars and I’d be spotted. Instead I took the Caldecott tunnel entrance, emerging into the grass verge between the lanes of traffic. Even though it was evening, it was pretty busy, and there was no way I was going to be able to run across. So I took a big risk. I gathered my concentration, and gave the whole flying thing another shot. Luckily, I made it over a lane of traffic before crash landing as I lost focus. I scrambled quickly to my feet, looking around, but none of the drivers seemed to have noticed me. Either the mist was helping me out, or kids usually randomly fell from the sky around here. 

I was suddenly exhausted; and I think I actually fell asleep for a few minutes, jerking back awake curled up in the grass.

With no solid idea on where I was planning to go, I figured I could do worse than get the bus to the station and just pick a train. Any train, and just see where I ended up. There were worse plans. I made the bus at a sprint, paying the fare while I gasped for breath and listened to my heart pounding in my ears. I slumped into a seat at the back of the mostly empty bus, yawning. Fishing through my bag for the cyclops’ jumper to use as a pillow, I came across the purple envelope that I hadn’t even opened yet, but shoved in absent mindedly. A lump came to my throat, and I blinked back yet more tears. I should have been so proud. Without really thinking about it, I opened the envelope. There wasn’t much inside: a small certificate, signed by Violet and Rich, congratulating us on a successful mission, two squares of ambrosia - a symbolic thing, to make up for injuries sustained on the task - and a couple of vouchers for some of the shops in New Rome. I shoved everything back in the envelope and when I couldn’t get it back into the poorly packed bag, pushed it into my pocket. I should have left it: I wouldn’t have any use for any of it anymore. 

Curled up with the jumper between my head and the window, I dozed off to sleep. 

Anya drew the string on her bow back, eyes fixed on Jack, and loosed. He yelped, loudly enough that I could hear it even at this distance from the fort walls, dropping his sword. Anya laughed, and Pablo gave her a high five. I turned my head slightly at a chuckle, and Mel was there too, grinning at them.  
“Nice shot.” Mel’s gaze flicked up to Temple Hill, outlined on the horizon, and the smile faded. With a jolt, I realized she was wondering if I was okay. Something curled in my mind, whispering _no she’s not_ , and I scowled, because I’m sure the voice was Louisa’s, and that was _not_ a voice I wanted in my head, thank you very much. Pablo yawned, almost dropping his shield on his own foot. Anya giggled quietly, but stopped when she yawned too. I wondered why they were feeling so sleepy, when they were in the middle of war games. Mel started to cough, and I moved towards her. I passed straight through, and I knew I was dreaming. Of course I was: I’d left. But I still didn’t wake up.

Mel was sitting down, looking an unhealthy ashy grey rather than her usual coppery tan, shivvering.  
“Somet - something’s wrong.” The others didn’t hear her, because they were asleep.

I ran from person to person, and they were all falling asleep. But they weren’t stopping: war games were continuing as usual, except that no-one was talking or laughing, or even shouting insults at one another. Mel had succumbed too, moving trance like through her stage in the offence. I trailed behind my cohort as they came up against the walls, and the lack of taunting from the Seconds on the wall terrified me. Desperate, I jumped and flew, much more easily than I ever had before, landing unseen, invisible, on the walkway, in time to see the orange glow bloom. Fire defences - they were burning something, sending up thick smoke that left a haze over the Field of Mars. Louisa turned from the brazier, a cloth mask over her face and a torch blazing in her hand. Alone of the others, even the Firsts and Seconds, she seemed awake. She nodded to herself, and walked away, Legionnaires letting her through without seeming to see her. I took off again, circling up into the sky, scanning for some clue as to what was going _on._ The wolves howled, faltering and rising again, as though they knew something was happening but were powerless to stop it. Then they cut off, and the Field of Mars blazed into ashes. 

I wasn’t on Temple Hill this time, but as the last echoes of Lupa’s howl faded, New Rome crumbled, followed by tower hill. The tidal wave crashed over me, and as it did a voice echoed in my mind. It was still Louisa’s voice, but it wasn’t. It was something deep and dark and cold, and it clenched like a fist around my heart, crushing and twisting.  
_If Rome burns, do you, probatio Disgrace?_

And I jerked awake, coughing and gasping.


	11. X. I play join the dots

I sat statue still in the back of the bus, trying to get my whirling thoughts in order. First up came: _Okay, this is weird._ Second: _What was with that dream?_ Third: _Wait, how did I even get here?_

I stared straight ahead. Could I remember getting on the bus? For a moment, I wasn’t sure. Then I remembered that I had, but distantly. As though it had been years ago, not a matter of hours - or even minutes, because looking around I realized we really hadn’t gone that far.  
“You alright, lad?” I jumped, and looked up into a friendly face, peering over the seat in front. I hadn’t noticed my breathing speed up into something frantic, almost gasping for air.  
“I - uh, yeah. Sorry. Dozed off and, um, lost track of where I was.”  
“Well, you can’t’ve missed your stop, no worries. We’ve barely gone anywhere. There’s an accident up ahead, traffic is murder. Best settle back down to sleep, kid. You look a bit better now, but you were walking like you were in a trance when you got on the bus.” She turned back to her book, and I was no longer a statue. I was frozen in place.  
_Walking in a trance?_

I took a shuddering breath, wrinkling my nose as I got a lungful of cyclops stink from the jumper under my cheek. But that breath of stale cyclops sweat probably made all the difference, because it cleared my head in a way I would usually have associated with, y’know, pure fresh mountain air, not monster BO. The foggy feeling faded away, and my mind raced, backtracking over everything that had happened that summer. The cold push when Rich had struggled to get out of Hannibal’s way, the same feeling when I was trying to make the praetors listen to me. The way no-one had seemed to want to follow up that someone had taken live arrows into war games, or how they’d gotten them without permission.

Almost as if they’d been in the armoury alone, unsupervised. Just as Louisa had been. The shocked, almost scared, expression she’d worn when she spotted me after the games came to mind, and for the first time I thought about why she’d be surprised to see me.

Because, of course, she must have thought I was no longer on the Field. Which, if I hadn’t moved out of Anya’s way at the last second, I wouldn’t have been. Which suggested that she’d known one of the Fifth had gone down because she’d shot the arrow, and that she’d intended for it to be me. I was starting to panic, mind spinning in circles, feeling like I hadn’t actually thought about anything for days - weeks, even - and was playing catch up. Taking deep breaths, I forced myself into battle ready calm, trying to go through things logically the way we had to in strategy meetings. What would have happened if I hadn’t been there after the end of war games? Nothing. Maybe the eagle would have died, but I couldn’t see Louisa being that fussed. It wasn’t like I’d done anything, anyway. All I’d done was watch. My own words came back to me: _Well, I_ am _the son of the sky god. I’m going to be more sensitive to stuff in the air, aren’t I?_

All I’d done was notice that it hadn’t just been bad luck. I’d felt the same presence in the praetors’ office too, and what had the end result of that been? Me, sat on this bus, leaving the only home I’d ever known in shame, with no plan. And I figured, more certain than I’d ever been about anything, that if Louisa Wells didn’t want me to be at Camp Jupiter, then that was _exactly_ where I needed to be.

The thought calmed me, and I grabbed my water bottle, taking a long sip as I worked out what to do. I had to get off the bus; I had to get back. And I needed to do both things as quickly as possible, because there were two ways this could go: I’d get back and nothing would be wrong, or I’d get back and _everything_ would be wrong. My instincts were screaming the latter, but even if it was the former, I needed to be back before war games finished and anyone noticed I had left at all. If I got back quickly enough, I could pretend this little jaunt had never happened. Sure, I wouldn’t have finished my punishment work, but whatever. I could fall asleep on my bunk and say I’d felt sick and not been up to it. My cohort would back me up; Mel would _happily_ fight even the praetors on it if she thought I was really ill. I just had to get back in time.

I scanned the bus, looking for a way off. Problem was, I’d been _noticed._ If I tried to just get off the bus, or even caused a distraction and ran off, the friendly person in front would notice. The driver would notice, because eleven year old kids getting on at the middle-of-nowhere stop (actually the “New Rome” stop) draws attention, which further convinced me that it hadn’t really been my idea to get the bus, because if I’d been thinking clearly I wouldn’t have done it. I’d have walked, or snuck on somehow, tagging along with a group so I seemed to be taken care of or something. We'd had whole training sessions on this kind of stuff. The traffic had cleared, whatever hold up further along having been solved, and I realised that my only real option was to wait until the next stop, and get off there. I fidgeted the entire time, cursing every foot the bus took me from home. 

When the bus drew up to the next stop - another sleepy, out of the way, in the middle of nowhere one, I leapt up.  
“Wait a sec - kid, you being met by anyone?” I cursed internally, and turned briefly to the concerned guy in the seat in front.   
“I - um - well, I was really tired and I did something stupid…”  
“You got on the wrong bus?” I nodded, trying to look embarrassed.  
“My big sister is meeting me when I get there, though.” I didn’t wait for any reply, feeling a little guilty. The poor guy was just being friendly, and an eleven year old on their own at this time was a bit odd. But the doors would close if I wasn’t careful, so I raced down the aisle and jumped off, trying to look like I knew exactly where I was and where I was going. I suppose I did - back the way I came.

Of course, the quickest way to do that really _was_ to get the bus in the other direction, so I had to wait, tapping my feet and feeling increasingly nervous, on the other side of the road until the coach pulled in. Then it was another jittery journey, thankfully quicker than the first had been, and I was back near the Caldecott tunnel. Sneaking back in was just as easy as sneaking out had been, and this time, that registered as strange. Normally the entrance was guarded by Legionnaires during the Camp season. But outside of full training, or during war games, Terminus was recruited to cover the wider boundary, rather than just the city limits. I should have been challenged by the head and torso of a Roman boundary god, intent on seeing all of my official documentation and the like for leaving Camp, rather than just walking straight out. Something was _definitely_ up.

I’m gonna claim that I was off balance, thrown by all this weirdness, okay? Because it was at this point that I made a kinda dumb decision. Rather than heading for the Field of Mars - or anywhere with a vantage point - what did I do? I headed straight for the Fifth’s barracks, putting my bag back in its usual place and taking a moment to reflect happily that literally nobody would know I’d ever left. I was even thinking of sneaking back over to the armoury to hide the sword, then heading back up to Temple Hill and pretend I’d been there the whole time, when the howling started. I shook my haze of stupor off, cursing, and grabbed my old shield. It was tiny, because when I say “old” I mean “made for me when I was six and insisted on joining in with training, despite the fact that I was only six and the shields were as tall as me.” But with the fuzz driven from my head again, my instincts were screaming that I didn’t have time to spare to go fetch a full size one. I also needed to work out what was going on before I slipped back into whatever trance mode I’d apparently been operating in for the last few hours. 

Running out of the barracks, I stumbled to a halt. There was a thin haze of smoke over everything, and panic welled up in my throat. But there was no orange glow on the temples, and New Rome was visible, solid and definitely _not_ on fire, which is always good. The smoke made me dizzy and now that I knew to look out for it, I could feel my brain slowing up. I remembered what had happened in my dream - Mel gasping out that something was wrong, but everyone falling asleep around her, sleepwalking through the plans they’d already laid, Louisa throwing something into the fire defences, and held my breath as I turned to the nearest brazier. They were placed at regular intervals around camp, to light the entrances to barracks, and to burn various bits of incense or whatever, in enchanted holders that contained the fire so it didn’t spread to the barracks or other buildings. Even so, buckets of water were provided, and I dumped one over the two fires outside my cabin. It put the fire out, but sent smoke and steam billowing up into my face. Spluttering, I waved it away, and poked through the ashy mess at the bottom of the brazier. It was pretty difficult to make anything out, but I could just about see the remnants of a herb bundle of some kind. Kinda like the ones some of Trivia’s children used for spells. The howls dipped and raised again, louder and more urgent, drawing my attention. Cursing myself for getting distracted, I started to run. It didn’t really matter exactly what was going on - whatever it was, I had to stop it. I threw a prayer to my dad, and called on the wind to help me fly to the Field of Mars.


	12. XI. Smokescreen

I’d love to say that I suddenly was able to soar like an eagle, and that in the moment when I needed it most, my flying was suddenly _flawless._ Unfortunately, I actually face planted only, like, twenty feet from the Fifth’s barracks when I lost concentration for a moment, but whatever. It was quicker than running. I will say that I was… better, as though the feeling of flying in my dream had sunk a little into my bones. Or maybe it was just because I was focused, more focused than I’d ever really been, on just getting where I needed to go. So I scrambled back up and took off again. This time I went higher, hoping to get above the smoke. Of course, the higher I got, the worse it would be if I crash landed, but I tried not to think about that.

It wasn’t exactly the smoothest flight, with lots of erratic dipping and diving and a couple of moments when I did unintentional loop the loops until I got the whole “steering in mid air using wind” thing back under control, but I made it to the Field of Mars with only a few bruises. I hovered, staring down at the carnage in front of me.

War games was in full flow, so it was probably tightly _planned_ carnage, but whatever. I could see the Fifth battering against the walls, the Thirds and Fourths hovering behind, waiting to scope out the defences. The Firsts and Seconds were firing water cannons and loading fireball ballistae, which they lobbed at the Thirds and Fourths. At a glance, everything was normal - but the fireballs were falling short, the other cohorts having scuttled back out of range, and the Firsts and Seconds didn’t seem to have noticed. And it was _silent_. No talking, no bellowing orders, nothing. No jeering, no laughter when a good shot took an enemy camper out of the game. Sure, we took war games seriously, but we were also a bunch of teenagers. And the eagles were down - all of them. Maybe the whole sleepwalking thing didn’t work when you were flying, and though for a moment I wanted nothing more than to zoom down to the Fifth and find Mel, Pablo, Anya and my other friends, to check they were okay and see if I could wake them, I didn’t want to find out that I’d lose the ability to fly if I got too close. Instead, I looked for Louisa - _not_ my usual priority in life.

I started in the obvious place: the inside of the fort, where I’d seen her in my dream. Yes, part of our super serious demigod training involves _winging it_ and _following our literal dreams and hoping they were actual visions not just dreams_. We’re reliable like that. But so far, things were checking out, so I rolled with it. She wasn’t where I’d expected her to be, by the fire, and for a moment I was stumped. Then it clicked - she’d _left_ the fort in my dream, _before_ the wolves had stopped howling. Before the wolves had even _started_ howling. I circled higher, dragging at the hot air from the defense fires and using the thermals, wobbling in the sky until I spotted the wolves. The howling was fading, and as I flew towards the wolves, higher in the sky than I’d ever been before, I could see why. Gradually, they too were falling asleep. The smoke from the fort was washing over the entire Field now, thick and clearly not natural. Louisa’s torch was a single light point, visible through the haze. The torch must’ve had the same magic in it as the fires, because whenever a wolf went for her, she swung it and they swayed, dropping down fast asleep.

Lupa snarled, and staggered to her feet. She seemed to be puzzled, wary and off balance, and Louisa just laughed at her. Gods aren’t usually scared by much, but Lupa was actually backing up a little. Wolves don’t fight lost battles, even Roman ones. But she didn’t move quickly enough. Louisa threw the torch at the ground in front of her, and the dry grass caught like tinder, blazing up with a rush of bitter smoke that had Lupa swaying and staggering. That blinded her to Louisa’s steady advance, and kept her from dodging as the Legionnaire’s pilum was swung into attack position.

It didn’t stop her howling loud enough to make my bones shake with the echo when the spear plunged through her flank, the sound abruptly cutting off and leaving a ringing in my ears.

I dived. It wasn’t thought, and honestly, I started because I lost control in shock and fell. But pretty quickly I was taking control again, pushing myself towards Louisa and Lupa as fast as I could. I hit Louisa like a thunderbolt, body slamming her into the ground and rolling away. I scrambled to my feet and ran to stand between her and the wolf goddess, clutching my forgotten sword and shield, heart pounding.  
“You - what - _what are you doing?_ ” My voice shook; not quite the fierce defender I was going for, but I just didn’t understand what was _happening_. Louisa looked about as confused, pushing herself up to glare at me and faltering. After a second, she huffed in annoyance, and got to her feet, drawing her own sword. She looked me over with absolute disdain, and I remembered that I wasn’t wearing armour, while she was fully kitted up for war games. Behind me, Lupa snarled, and the sound steadied me. I was a Roman; and this was my _pack_. That was what I had been told, years before, left in the wolf house as a peace offering to Juno. I could do this - whatever _this_ turned out to be. I had to do this. She tore the mask off, letting it fall to the ground.  
“What are you doing here?” It wasn’t the response I’d been expecting, and I didn’t really think about my reply.  
“I _live_ here.” She rolled her eyes.  
“Regrettably, yes, probatio. But you’re supposed to be halfway to San Frisco by now. You were not supposed to _be here_.” For a moment she looked worried, and it was comforting. If me being here messed with her plans, then all the better. 

“Eh, I had a change of heart.” We were both shifting where we stood, searching for solid footing and an opening, trying to distract each other into slipping up. Lupa shifted and groaned quietly, almost a whimper, if a god can make a sound that undignified. She wasn’t going to be able to help me. I was going to have to help her - a really scary thought, in a really topsy turvy day.   
_“Curse_ you, Grace.”   
“So, what’s with all the smoke? Didn’t they ever tell you it’s bad for your lungs?” She glared.  
“Ugh, you are such a stuck up little -” For a moment, it felt like the sun had gone behind a cloud, and I shuddered. Louisa grimaced. “Fine. Fine. Tough luck, kiddo, I’m not telling you what’s up. But you’re gonna have to get outta my way now. I’ve got a useless piece of ancient history to destroy.” Lupa managed another weak snarl, and I realized I’d done the same - one of those little side effects of being raised partly by wolves.   
“Not. A. _Chance.”_  
“Fine then.” And she struck. 

I brought the mini shield up and dodged, whirling on the spot to bring my own sword down on her neck, but I’d misjudged her height and instead I just thwacked her amour clad back. She still stumbled a little, but not enough to give me any advantage. I dodged and ducked, never quite having time to launch an attack of my own. Lupa groaned, a wheezy whuffling that made me falter, and I dragged my attention back to the fight a little too late, collapsing as Louisa’s sword stabbed into the muscle on my thigh. She grinned ruthlessly, and for the first time since I’d met her, she didn’t set me on edge. She wasn’t hiding anything, now. She wasn’t a Legionnaire, she wasn’t a Roman. She was a traitor, and she was _herself_. And I was finally free to despise her as much as I liked. Shame I was about to die and not get to enjoy the guilt-free hatred.  
“Oh _dear,_ probatio. They really did hand everything to you on a plate, didn’t they? The _star_ pupil, little son of _Jupiter._ ” The smile faded into a hard line, and her attention shifted to Lupa again, discounting me entirely. I tried to stand, hissing between my teeth in pain, as she walked by, and she actually laughed, landing a vicious kick that knocked me over onto my side. “Don’t worry, kid, once the wolf is gone, Rome won’t take long to follow. And I’ll start with you, ‘kay? Damn cyclops was supposed to do it weeks ago.” Gasping and shaking with pain, I watched as she advanced on Lupa, sword at the ready. Cold fury welled up in the pit of my stomach, and for a horrible moment I thought the roaring in my ears was the tidal wave coming to wash everything away, just as it had in my dream. But it wasn’t the sea - it was the wind, and it was _mine._

As the sword came up, I screamed in fury - or maybe I howled, wolf-like - and fresh, clear air slammed down from the atmosphere with a pressure change that made my ears pop. Louisa was knocked off her feet again, and the haze of smoke spiralled up into the atmosphere, displaced by the sudden rush of air I’d dragged down. The effect was almost instantaneous. The snoring wolves woke, still muggy with sleep, looking around in confusion and growing anger. I guess they could smell Lupa’s blood, because the nearest ones started to snarl. Louisa looked like she might too, glaring at me with more hatred than ever, but there was another moment of cold _wrongness_ in the air, and she pushed herself to her feet. Taking one last look at us, she grimaced, then turned and ran. The wolves were still half-asleep, not quite up to processing chasing yet, and I knew I wasn’t up to it either. Controlling the wind as much as I had done had left me weak and shaky, or maybe that was shock and blood loss. I probably would have lain there staring up at the patchy blue sky until the other Legionnaires came to find out what was going on, except Lupa let out one more whimper, even fainter than the last.

I forced myself to roll over, but didn’t bother trying to stand up. Instead, I crawled over. Golden ichor, the blood of the gods, spilled from around the pilum, splashing onto the ground and steaming when it landed. Her flanks were heaving, and I didn’t need to be a medic to guess she was dying. Gods can’t really _die_ , not that easily, but I got the feeling that if this - if this _incarnation_ of Lupa died, _something_ would happen. Maybe gods were a little like monsters. Maybe if you killed one, they would disappear for a while before materializing. How long would Lupa have to be gone for the Legion, the legacy of Rome, to crumble?

But I wasn’t a medic, and I didn’t know what to do. I gingerly stroked Lupa’s head, pushing myself up into a kneeling position. Something rustled in my pocket, and I remembered the envelope from the praetors - and the ambrosia it contained. It was a slim hope, but I went with it because it was better than nothing. Two squares of ambrosia wouldn’t be enough to fix a half blood from that kind of injury, so it might not do anything for a god. Alternatively, it might help her hang on long enough for the healers. At first Lupa didn’t want to eat, crazed with pain and shock, but after I stuffed half a square into her mouth as she growled, she changed her mind. I guess she recognized the taste, and for a moment I wondered what ambrosia tasted like to her. She seemed to be in a little less pain, and I could convince myself the bleeding had slowed - but I really wasn’t certain if that was because the ambrosia was helping, or because she was really running out of time. I twisted my head, scanning the sky. I could make out a few dark dots, eagles taking back to the sky, and called as loud as I could.  
“Over here! Medic! HELP!"

I saw one turn, wheeling towards us, but as it drew closer it got less distinct. It wasn’t until my vision went completely grey that I realised it wasn’t some new danger. It was just me fainting. I vaguely heard someone jumping down, cursing and shouting for back up, as I toppled forwards on top of Lupa’s furry shoulders.


	13. XII. I get a messenger...eagle?

I came around in the infirmary, squinting up at the ceiling.  
“Morning, sleepy head.” Mel’s voice was aiming for light, but had a quiver in it that screamed _thank all the gods!_  
“Mornin’” I coughed, and she helped me sit up and passed me a glass of water. “How long..?”  
“Only overnight, Jace. They fixed the leg up, but you’re going to be pretty shaky. You’d really burnt yourself out, kiddo.” I nodded, feeling content, before I remembered Lupa and tried to leap out of bed.  
“Lupa! Louisa, she -”  
“Yeah, yeah, Lupa’s fine. Sore and _furious,_ but fine.” Mel pushed me back down with gentle hands. “You got the medic’s attention just in time. She’s gonna be absolutely okay. She recovered more quickly than you, once they got the pilum out and gave her a tonne of ambrosia. _You,_ on the other hand, have to stay put and rest up.” I nodded obediently, already feeling sleepy again, and she stood, ruffling my hair fondly. “Right. I’m gonna go tell the medics, then Vi and Rich, that you’re awake. I’ll be back soon.”

In the end, they kept me in the infirmary for two days, and when I was let out it was with strict instructions that I was to not train fully. Unfortunately, that wouldn’t get me out of the morning run, but you can’t have everything. Even the walk back from New Rome with Mel was tiring, but she’d picked up celebratory brownies before collecting me, and they kept me going all the way home, and through evening muster. Technically I should’ve been scolded, because I didn’t have all my gear, but Vi just nodded and smiled at me as she checked us off on roll call. The two praetors conferred for a moment, checking that everyone was indeed there, and raised a hand each to get everyone’s attention for an announcement. Pablo groaned quietly, and Anya muttered something about how if there were war games again, she was going to do a runner. My ears burned with embarassment, but Mel gripped my shoulder and squeezed lightly. I hadn’t told Vi or Rich that I’d tried to leave, but I’d told Mel. It wasn’t something I could keep from her, really. I'd probably known that deep down even when I was trying to sneak back undetected. She’d been sad, but told me not to mention it to anyone else - what mattered, she figured, was that I’d come back. Besides, the entire summer had been filled with stupid decisions that seemed to have been controlled by Louisa and her mist bending. She’d been good enough to fool everyone into not checking out who her godly ancestor was - Octavian had been right on the mark when he pointed out that mist-bending was a common trait of Trivia’s, even if he’d been thinking of someone else. Between us, Mel and I thought maybe my decision to leave had been one of those - at least, Mel did. I thought that maybe it had been my idea. Whether I would’ve actually done it without Louisa’s influence? I dunno. I liked to think not. I dragged my attention back to the announcement when I heard my name.  
“Probatio Grace; please come forwards.” Mel gave me a gentle push, and I stumbled a little, taken aback, making my way over to the praetors on trembling legs. It wasn’t me they addressed, however. It was the entire Legion they talked to, while I stood a little awkwardly, trying not to fidget.

“The events of the last war games still require some discussion. What is currently known is that Louisa Wells, Legionnaire of the First cohort, betrayed the Legion, for what reason we still do not know. She is declared henceforth an enemy of Rome, for the attempted murder of Lupa. We will be searching for her to bring her to the justice of the Legion.” I shivvered a little. Roman justice could be harsh; by turning traitor and attempting to kill Lupa? Louisa had signed herself a Roman death on sight warrant.  
“Had it not been for the quick and valiant action of probatio Grace, she would have been successful in her attempt. As such, we, your praetors, and Lupa, have decided unanimously that Jason Grace has proved himself in an act of true valour, and is declared worthy to be a full Legionnaire of Rome in the Twelfth Legion. Augur!” Octavian came forwards, and there was an awkward pause as he took my arm to give me the SPQR tattoo, when he remembered that I’d already got it, thanks to Juno having decided to make it very clear when I arrived that I was to join the Legion. As if they’d let a son of Jupiter do anything else. I grinned at him, not caring that this was supposed to be serious, and after a second he smirked back.  
“I declare you, Jason Grace, Son of Jupiter, a true Legionnaire of the Twelfth Legion Fulminata… _again_.” He muttered the last, and I bit my lip to keep from laughing. Risus, stay away, please! My tattoo warmed, briefly, at the words, but thankfully didn’t sting the way it did when I first got it. We turned to the Legion, who were all cheering - even the ones who didn’t much like me.

I fell asleep almost immediately after dinner, which had felt like a celebration party. I’d gone from being the disgrace to being the _saving_ grace, and by the end of the evening I honestly wasn’t certain which was more embarrassing. But hey. That’s what friends are for, right?

Yet again, I stood before my father’s temple, looking out over New Rome. But this time, no fires burned, and when I turned my head, Camp Jupiter was still there, peaceful but alert. I stayed put for a while, just enjoying the view and knowing that we were safe, until a noise made me look up. A gigantic golden eagle spiraled down out of the sky. It landed on the edge of a bench in front of me, and made an almost bow. I bowed back, not sure what to do, but certain of one thing - this was one of my father’s immortal eagles, from which the giant eagles of Camp Jupiter were descended. After looking at me, head tilted, for a few minutes, it flew off again. I watched it leave, and turned back to the bench. It had left something behind - a golden coin, gleaming in the setting sun. I picked it up, confused, turning it over in my fingers. It wasn’t a coin I recognised. On one side was engraved a sword, on the other a pilum, and on both was one word - _Ivlivs_. On a whim, I flicked it into the air with my thumb, wondering what it meant. It was only luck that I caught it, because as it fell it morphed into a sword, and I almost dropped it in surprise. I stared at my own wide eyed reflection in the Imperial Gold blade.  
“Father..?”

This time, I didn’t wake screaming, or sobbing, or even scared, which made a change. Instead I felt… peaceful. I sat up, and realised I was clutching the golden coin.  
“Ivlivs.” I muttered the weapon’s name to myself, and grinned. I had my own Imperial Gold weapon; an actual gift _from my father_. The thought made me pause. The gods rarely contacted us, except to claim their children or legacies, and honestly that was a formality. The godly equivalent of an automated text, in many ways. If my father felt I deserved - _needed_ \- for him to contact me, even through a dream eagle, then it had to be important. After a moment, I shrugged and put Ivlivs into the side pocket of my bag, within easy reach. Whatever was coming, I’d just have to deal with it as Romans always did - alongside my cohort, with my Legion, and by any means necessary. 

And in the meantime? Seeing as there was still an hour before I had to get up for the morning run, I lay back down to get some more, hopefully dreamless, sleep.


	14. Who's who & glossary

**Who’s who: the spotters guide to the Olympic Deities**

  * **Apollo -** God of the sun, and various other things notably healing, music and prophecy. It’s an eclectic mix, to say the least. [Greek = Apollo] (Octavian’s relative of some description, fairly distant)
  * **Diana** \- Maiden goddess of the hunt and moon. Tends to disdain men, so if you do meet her, be uber-respectful, and if there are any girls on your team, let them do the talking. Also, the maiden thing is _not a joke,_ so under no circumstances attempt to flirt. Well, it’s never a good idea to flirt with the gods, but especially not with the ones who’ve taken vows of chastity: you will be turned into something and die a horrible death [Greek = Artemis]
  * **Epione** \- Goddess of the soothing of pain - literally the queen of painkillers. Married to Vejovis, god of healing, a match made in heaven (almost literally), and one of the most frequently called upon and worshipped gods on Temple Hill, because after a day of training you really want Epione to smile on you. Not one to annoy, unless you really are masochistic even by Roman standards. [Greek = Epione]
  * **Fortuna -** Goddess of luck and chance. Any time you really hope for something luck based? You’re calling on Fortuna, whether you know it or not, so every time you cross your fingers? Yeah, that counts as a prayer, so you’ve probably prayed to her plenty of times without even knowing about it. [Greek = Tyche]
  * **Jupiter** \- God of sky and lighting; King of the Gods, with many epithets and legends. My father, though due to his divine work commitments we bond at godly arm’s reach. [Greek = Zeus]
  * **Juno** \- Goddess of women and marriage, protector and counselor of Rome. My godly stepmom and patron, though again she tends to watch me from afar, and exchange letters at the appropriate holidays rather than popping by for tea every Saturday. [Greek = Hera]
  * **Lupa** \- Wolf goddess who raised the twins Romulus and Remus, who went on to fight to the death over who got to name their new city. Romulus won, hence why it got named Rome. Lupa is also the godly head of the Legion: the praetors actually run it and make most of the decisions, but Lupa will advise when she feels necessary. She’s one camp director you do not want to cross. Good with small children.
  * **Mars** \- God of war, with special links to Rome. The Field of Mars is our own personal “war ground”, used in war games and for the occasional major training exercise, which admittedly usually end up turning into something approaching actual war. [Greek = Ares]
  * **Mercury** \- God of travelers, communications and thieves. Also poetry, for some reason, though Apollo also does some of that (whether the other gods like it or not). The fleet footed messenger of the gods, Mercury is always on the move, and has some handy flying sandals to help him out. One of Jupiter’s godly sons, so technically my half brother, I guess? [Greek = Hermes] (Pablo’s dad)
  * **Risus** \- Spirit of laughter, absolute riot at parties, tends to hang out in comedy clubs and anywhere people are trying desperately to keep a straight face. [Greek = Gelos]
  * **Somnus** \- God of sleep, but don’t take that lightly. He may be responsible for you catching forty winks or a solid eight hours, if you ask really nicely and he’s in a good mood, but he also punishes people who doze off when they’re not supposed to. Like, falling asleep on guard duty at Camp Jupiter comes with an extra high risk of being unable to sleep for the next week. [Greek = Hypnos] (Natalino’s great great granddad)
  * **Terminus** \- God of boundaries. Literally the ancient Roman god of border control and passport checks, with non-optional extra advice on Correct Roman Legionnaire Attire and Grooming. His statue at Camp Jupiter lacks arms, but he’s still perfectly capable of magically poofing weapons out of your hands or giving you a nasty shock, so be polite and do as he says.
  * **Trivia** \- Goddess of magic and crossroads _, frequently_ mistaken as goddess of small and usually pointless pieces of information. [Greek = Hectate] (Melody’s mom)
  * **Vejovis** \- God of healing, generally of humans - there are other gods who focus on, for example, cattle. Probably recieves the most offerings and thanks at Camp Jupiter, because we tend to need his blessings a lot. [Greek = Asclepius] (Bobby’s granddad)
  * **Venus** \- Goddess of love, with a sideline in beauty. Like many gods, a case of “take at face value and you are doomed”, so don’t make the mistake of thinking that being lady love makes her - or her kids - pushovers. They will tear you apart, usually while looking _flawless_. [Greek = Aphrodite] (Victoria’s great great great grandma)
  * **Vulcan** \- God of the forge and all things mechanical. Born deformed and promptly thrown off of Olympus for not fitting the required godly image, but builds machines as beautiful as he is not. [Greek = Hephaestus] (Alexei’s dad)



**Glossary**

  * **Aurae** \- Wind spirits who help out at Camp Jupiter serving food. Do not imply they are slow; they really don't appreciate it and you don't want the spirits providing all of your food to decide you're an ungrateful twerp who should be shown the error of their ways  

  * **Denarii -** Ancient Roman coins; don’t work in vending machines and only use in a mortal shop if you want the police called, but can be spent in New Rome and in a few other select demigod places.
  * **Dis** \- One of the three terms for the underworld (yeah, you heard me: Three. Try to keep track of them all. This is my favourite).
  * **Hades** \- One of the three terms for the underworld (this is probably the one you’ve heard of).
  * **Lares** \- Guardian deities or spirits, slightly see through and nearly all somewhat old fashioned, not to mention nearly all annoying.
  * **Pilum** \- Roman spear. Try to avoid getting stabbed with - it hurts.
  * **Pluto** \- One of the three terms for the underworld (confusingly, Pluto the god is actually nameless: he can be called Dis, Hades, or Pluto, after his realm. We generally go with Pluto, though).
  * **Probatio** \- The probation rank of the Twelfth Legion, i.e. bottom of the food chain.
  * **Rudes** \- Roman practice swords made out of wood, because even we get fed up patching each other up and cleaning blood off of our actual swords sometimes.
  * **Via Praetoria** \- The main road through the city of New Rome, leading into Camp Jupiter, the Legion’s base, through the Praetorian Gate.
  * **Via Principalis** \- The main road through the middle of Camp Jupiter itself, running perpendicular to the Via Praetoria 




End file.
